Using virtual reality for drug discovery: a promising new outlet for novel leads

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Virtual reality (VR) environments are increasingly being used by researchers in various fields in addition to being increasingly integrated into various areas of human life, ranging from videogames to different industrial uses. VR can be used to create interactive and multimodal sensory stimuli and thus offers unique advantages over other computer-based approaches for scientific research and molecular-level applications. Consequently, VR is starting to be used in novel drug development, such as in drug discovery, and rational drug design.

Areas covered: In this review, the authors discuss the basic development of VR technology, including the available hardware and software. The latest advances of VR technology in novel drug development are then detailed, and the VR programs that can be applied in relevant studies are highlighted.

Expert opinion: VR will lead to a revolution in pharmaceutical development. However, there are still obstacles to the successful and extensive application of VR to drug development, including the demand for further improvements to the available hardware and software and the various limitations described with regard to accuracy and precision. As technology continues to improve, the barriers to the widespread adoption of VR will diminish and VR technologies will play an increasingly important role in novel drug development.

KEYWORDS:

• Virtual reality
• drug development
• scientific visualization
• ImmersivePDB
• Molecular Rift
• accuracy and precision

Article highlights

● Application of VR has significant advantages over traditional screening methods in the discovery of novel drugs, including the interactive and multimodal sensory stimuli.

● With the increasing development of VR techniques, various approaches have been proposed and applied in the field of drug development such as ImmersivePDB, Molecular Rift, MolDRIVE, RealityConvert, and so on.

● The capability to combine VR approach with other computer-aided techniques would make it a very useful tool in novel drug discovery such as application of VR visualization to molecular docking, interactive drug design, and interactive MD.

● Several factors might lead to an unsuccessful application of VR, such as the limitations in the associated hardware, software, and in the accuracy and precision of position and timing tracking of VR system.

● Further studies should be focused on increasing fidelity, lowering the costs, combining VR with holographic projection and autonomous systems, and identifying important affecting factors.

This box summarizes key points contained in the article.

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to Wiley Editing Services for reviewing and editing the language where appropriate.

Declaration of interest

The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

Reviewer disclosures

One referee, an employee of AstraZeneca, declares that they have authored work on one of the mentioned tools, the ‘Molecular Rift’ and is the founder of a VR start-up company.

Additional information

Funding

The authors are supported by the National Natural Science Foundation Cultivation Project of Jining Medical University (grant no. JYP201704) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 21376215).