NovaMechanics Ltd is an R&D performing SME committed to the computer aided design of new materials, small-molecules and nanoparticles. NovaMechanics is focused in the development and implementation of in silico methods to guide decisions in the design and selection of promising candidates. Through the combination of industry-recognized expertise, state of the art software and proprietary computing infrastructure, the company's advanced in silico capabilities in molecular design provide the most effective path to molecular innovation. There is a multidisciplinary experience in R&D projects (systems biology, drug discovery, nanoinformatics, health and environmental risk assessment, computational toxicology, property modelling & prediction etc.)
NovaMechanics contribution to the project will be the application of cheminformatics methods such as quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR) modelling to establish statistically significant relationships between measured biological activity profiles of MNPs and their physical, chemical, and other properties, either measured experimentally or computed from the structure of MNPs.
Key People
Dr. Antreas Afantitis PhD, MBA (director of NovaMechanics Ltd). Antreas Afantitis is an experienced consultant in chemoinformatics, nanoinformatics and applied drug discovery projects. He has a strong scientific background in the field of bioinformatics and medicinal chemistry (Google Scholar H-index=20). He has been included in the most productive authors in Chemoinformatics (bibliometric by Prof. Peter Willet). He is the Section Editor for Combinatorial/Medicinal Chemistry. He has developed several virtual screening methodologies to drug discovery problems (filling 3 patents and publishing several articles in top journals with results). He is actively involved (PI or co-PI) in 3 FP7 European Union projects, 2 Cost Actions, 1 Eureka and 4 National R&D projects.
Georgia Melagraki PhD, MBA. She is an experienced consultant in chemoinformatics, nanoinformatics and applied drug and materials design projects. With a strong scientific background in the field of computational and organic chemistry, she has developed several computational tools using virtual screening and informatics methods, to support decisions under uncertainty and reduce costs and timescales. Author of more than 40 original research papers in international journals (H-index = 20, Google Scholar), her articles have been highlighted several times in the top cited and accessed articles. She is a reviewer in more than 30 leading scientific journals, and invited member of Editorial Boards in top international journals. She is actively involved in several competitive EU and national grants as PI.
Involvement in Research and Innovation projects
NovaMechanics awarded funding for the following projects:
- nanoMILE: Enginneered nanomaterial mechanisms of interactions with living systems and the environment: a universal framework for safe nanotechnology FP7 (2013-2017)
- THALAMOSS: THALAssaemiaMOdular Stratification System for personalized therapy of beta-thalassemia FP7 (2012-2016)
- Cost ActionCM1106 «Chemical Approaches to Targeting Drug Resistance in Cancer Stem Cells» (2012-2015)
Publications and/or research/innovation products
- Georgia Melagraki, AntreasAfantitis. EnalosInSilicoNano Platform: An online decision support tool for the design and virtual screening of nanoparticles RSC Adv., 2014,4, 50713-50725
- Georgia Melagraki, AntreasAfantitis "A risk assessment tool for the virtual screening of metal oxide nanoparticles through EnalosInSilicoNano Platform" "Current Topics in Medicinal Chemistry" (Vol. 15, No. 18, 2015) Accepted
- E. Vrontaki, G. Leonis, A. Avramopoulos, M. G. Papadopoulos, M. Simcic, S. G. Grdadolnik, A. Afantitis, G. Melagraki, S. K. Hadjikakou, and T. Mavromoustakos. Stability and binding effects of silver(I) complexes at lipoxygenase-1. Journal of EnzymeInhibition, DOI: 10.3109/14756366.2014.951348
- Vrontaki, E., Melagraki, G., Mavromoustakos, T., Afantitis, A. Exploiting ChEMBL database to identify indole analogs as HCV replication inhibitors (2014) Methodsdoi: 10.1016/j.ymeth.2014.03.021
- E. Tzanetou, S. Liekens, K.M. Kasiotis, G. Melagraki, A. Afantitis, N. Fokialakis, S.A. HaroutounianAntiproliferative Novel Isoxazoles: Modeling, Virtual Screening, Synthesis, and Bioactivity Evaluation European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry (2014), doi: 10.1016/ j.ejmech.2014.05.011