We are pleased to share the poster made in collaboration with Novartis and presented by our colleague Amanda Santos at SETAC in 2024.
The implications of substance persistence in the environment, including that of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), are of great relevance in environmental risk assessment and hazard classification (PBT: persistence-bioaccumulation-toxicity / PMT: persistence-mobility-toxicity). Current approaches for persistence assessments, specifically the OECD 308 test with freshwater sediment, are too resource-intensive to be practicable during early drug discovery stages, often requiring the use of radiolabelled substances and an average test duration of 100 days. To overcome these limitations, screening methods for aerobic transformation in aquatic sediment systems are needed. These should enable for a time- and labour-saving classification of early-stage drug candidates into respective biodegradability classes (persistent, not persistent) and serve as an additional criterion for drug candidate prioritisation along the research & development process.
This work covers a valuable starting point towards a functional screening method.
