Originating from the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, Unravel Biosciences has developed a vertically integrated computational platform to discover better drug targets.

Instead of classic pharma, which takes a target of interest and develops drugs to bind that specific target, Unravel’s platform screens many drugs in parallel for their real-world impact (e.g., the complete gene expression profiles and resulting physiological changes), reversing this process to identify the likely target(s) a drug is interacting with. Unravel’s integrated system, a combination of cell culture, a scalable CRISPR-based disease model (tadpoles), and proprietary computational software, transforms the linear process of drug discovery into an iterative loop where the outputs are continually refined.

Founded in 2021, the company is led by Richard Novak, Ph.D., a Lead Engineer at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering. He is also a founder and president of the nonprofit Future Scientist and a founder and director of the sample collection technology company Rhinostics Inc.

Unravel Biosciences’ initial focus is to accelerate and de-risk the development of effective treatments for patients living with rare genetic diseases. The company also partners with discovery companies in the areas of target discovery, mechanism identification, drug optimization, and patient stratification for small molecules and biologics.