MIT-Takeda Program wraps up with 16 publications, a patent, and nearly two dozen projects completed
MIT News, as part of the coverage of MIT's School of Engineering, features the MIT-Takeda Programme, an MIT Jameel Clinic powered initiative, that is now drawing to a close having produced multiple joint research papers, discoveries and a patent for a system that could improve the manufacturing of small-molecule medicines.
Launched in February 2020, the programme is a collaboration between Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited and MIT's school of engineering, and focused on leveraging both organisations' expertise to explore AI in healthcare and drug development. During its operation, MIT researchers and Takeda employees collaborated on 22 projects tackling drug development challenges and more than 150 Takeda researchers and staff participated in educational programming organised by the MIT Jameel Clinic.
A second element of the programme that will continue is the MIT-Takeda Fellowship, which supports graduate students as they pursue groundbreaking research related to health and AI and has supported 44 MIT-Takeda fellows to date.
When the Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. and the MIT School of Engineering launched their collaboration focused on artificial intelligence in health care and drug development in February 2020, society was on the cusp of a globe-altering pandemic and AI was far from the buzzword it is today.
As the program concludes, the world looks very different. AI has become a transformative technology across industries including health care and pharmaceuticals, while the pandemic has altered the way many businesses approach health care and changed how they develop and sell medicines.
For both MIT and Takeda, the program has been a game-changer.
When it launched, the collaborators hoped the program would help solve tangible, real-world problems. By its end, the program has yielded a catalog of new research papers, discoveries, and lessons learned, including a patent for a system that could improve the manufacturing of small-molecule medicines.
Ultimately, the program allowed both entities to create a foundation for a world where AI and machine learning play a pivotal role in medicine, leveraging Takeda’s expertise in biopharmaceuticals and the MIT researchers’ deep understanding of AI and machine learning.