“Digital skin”: the innovative technology developed to avoid animal testing

Health is undergoing a revolution thanks to technology that has become an ally in the development of solutions. This becomes evident when developing drugs and how they are delivered. However, it is still not as efficient, since trial drugs take many years to get approved and come to market, if at all.

This is why an organization called Tata Consulting Services (TCS) he is looking for ways to develop technology that helps solve these problems in a more efficient, economical and ethical way.

The Digital Twins or digital twins, they are virtual representation models that act as replicas of products, services, or processes that span their life cycle , is updated from real-time data and uses simulation, machine learning, and reasoning to aid in decision-making. These virtual replicas are used to run simulations before real object modifications are created and implemented, to collect data to predict their performance.

William Quinn, Senior Director of Futures Business at TCS, explains: “This allows physical objects to be projected into the digital world for prediction and optimization purposes across different industries. A digital twin can be a person or parts of a human being such as a heart or a brain; a place, such as a town or a farm; or something like a car or a piece of machinery.

This technology was first hinted at in 1991 and applied to the manufacturing concept in 2002. But it was NASA’s John Vickers who adopted the term digital twin in 2010, in order to maintain and repair systems when they weren’t nearby.

Although the concept takes time, the innovations seem limitless, and in healthcare, the technological revolution and machine learning are contributing to everything from how we find and develop medicines to how these medicines are administered.

From now on, the company TCS has patented a promising technology called “digital skin”, which could not only completely change the way drugs are delivered in the body, but also reduce the need for animal testing in years to come.

He TCS first report Called Digital Twindex, it examines when and how digital twins will affect different industries in the future, including their potential and risks. Among its results, it appears that 90% of respondents believe that the digital twins will be widely adopted in healthcare over the next six years to create personalized treatment plans, predict health outcomes, manage chronic disease, and accelerate drug development.

Quinn is optimistic about the future of digital twins in healthcare: “Everyone, from patients to doctors to researchers, will benefit from digital twins in the context of healthcare. Once fully modeled human bodies have been created as twins, researchers will be able to test new drugs and surgical techniques in cyberspace, without risking human or animal lives, as is currently necessary. »

The new TCS computer model, which uses a “digital skin” to simulate the ways drugs can be delivered, could help solve these problems, because makes it possible to test creams and other cosmetic products to find out their effects on humans, without the need to use animals.

Digital skin development by TCS is a digital replica of each distinct layer of skin. It uses synthetic biology using AI, virtual reality and other technologies to create a digital twin that emulates the physicochemical properties of human skin. This, the company says, allows researchers to explore hundreds of thousands of drug and molecule combinations, far beyond what is currently achievable with traditional animal testing.

Digital skin tests are much more accurate and are more likely to lead to effective products, as hundreds of experiments typically need to be performed for a drug to reach the desired clinical stage. With a digital model, they can be tested thousands of times and more if desired, and inexpensively.

“Using a digital skin, researchers can test how new drug formulations are transported through the epidermal layers, which in the past relied on animal testing. This technology could quickly speed the development and approval of new cosmetic products, as well as reduce or eliminate the need for animal testing. » comments the Senior Director of Futures at TCS.

Additionally, animal models do not replicate human behavior, which very often means your drug fails in the later stages of clinical trials.

Good news for millions of animals that are used for medical research each year. This news comes on top of Canada’s announcement to ban the use of animals to test cosmetics, calling it “cruel and unnecessary”. With this, it joins European Union (EU) countries that have banned animal testing since 2004, and other countries such as Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Australia, United Kingdom and South Korea, which also have regulations that restrict animal testing. for cosmetics.

“This is a great advantage considering that the tendency to prefer cruelty-free products is increasing every day among consumers and that the list of countries that have banned the use of animals in the cosmetics industry keeps getting longer, Quinn finishes.