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]]>As our understanding of molecular biology deepens, the concept of the “average patient” is disappearing. Common conditions like diabetes, cancer, and neurological disorders are increasingly understood as distinct, genetic and molecular subtypes. As a result, many areas of biomedical research now face the same constraints (small patient populations and complex biology) that rare disease researchers have navigated for decades. To overcome these barriers, the rare disease community has built a culture of open sharing, radical collaboration, and patient-led research.
At Conscience, we believe that no patient should be left behind because a market is too small or a discovery path is too risky. If we apply the collaborative lessons of rare disease research to the broader medical landscape, we will move closer to a world where every patient gets the treatment they need.
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]]>The post Introducing BEACON: The Benchmarking, Evaluation, and Assessment Consortium for Science appeared first on Conscience.
]]>For more information, contact:
Estrid Jakobsen at [email protected]
Julia Smith at [email protected]
View this press release on Business Wire »

Toronto, ON, Canada, February 23, 2026 — Today marks the official launch of BEACON (Benchmarking, Evaluation, and Assessment Consortium for Science), a new consortium dedicated to establishing a comprehensive and adaptable framework for validating research and predictions on complex or emerging biological systems. The consortium brings together leaders across disciplines to conduct open evaluations of predictive models in biology and medicine, coordinate community efforts to advance reproducible science, and guide AI-driven innovation in disease biology and drug discovery, ultimately accelerating new directions in research and catalyzing the development of safer, more effective treatments with real-world impact.
Conscience, a non-profit focused on enabling drug discovery and development through open collaboration, is acting as the central coordinator for the initiative, facilitating collaboration and ensuring the consortium meets its goals of transparency, rigour, and broad scientific and community engagement.
BEACON unites five organizations with deep expertise and proven track records in benchmarking and critical assessment: CASP (Critical Assessment of Structure Prediction), DREAM (Dialogue on Reverse Engineering Assessment and Methods), Sage Bionetworks, OpenADMET and CACHE/Conscience. The consortium aims to increase the collective impact of critical assessment approaches across the scientific community, strengthen rigour and reproducibility in research, and create a comprehensive, adaptable benchmarking framework that advances AI and computational approaches to disease research and drug discovery. It also focuses on developing innovative solutions for benchmarking foundation models and AI agents. The consortium welcomes participation from other researchers, institutions, and organizations committed to advancing open and reproducible science.
BEACON’s initiatives will include a benchmarking think-tank to promote methodological coherence and thought leadership, and an open platform that runs challenges, engages communities, and provides easy access to data and methods for accelerated collective learnings, among other tasks.
Founding Governance Committee members of BEACON include:
Members of the consortium will be participating in the MAINFRAME Symposium on AI-Driven Small-Molecule Drug Discovery in Barcelona from March 18-19, 2026. The Symposium aims to bring together the global community working at the intersection of artificial intelligence, computational chemistry, and small-molecule drug discovery. Conscience, together with several founding partners of BEACON, will lead a dedicated session on benchmarking to formally introduce the consortium, outline its approach to rigorous and open evaluation of AI methods, and engage directly with the machine learning research community. The session will celebrate BEACON’s public launch and provide an opportunity for researchers to offer feedback and help shape the initiative’s early priorities.
Quotes
“Biology is generating extraordinary amounts of data, but our ability to interpret and critically assess that information has not kept pace, contributing to replication failures and research misdirection,” says John Moult, Co-founder and Chair of CASP. “CASP and other initiatives like it have shown that open, community-driven science, combined with rigorous and independent assessment, can produce validated answers to complex biological problems at scale. BEACON applies those same principles, integrating open collaboration, advanced AI, and critical evaluation to identify gaps, clarify what is reliable, and inform more effective directions for future research.”
“DREAM is extremely pleased to join BEACON,” says Gustavo Stolovitzky, Founder and Chair of the DREAM Challenges. “The field of critical assessment has become increasingly fragmented, and we hope to attract other kindred organizations that promote crowdsourced, collaborative competitions to join BEACON in advancing the principles of open, collaborative, and reproducible science.”
“Rigorous benchmarking helps define the best approaches to analyze data, including the data publicly available at EMBL-EBI. BEACON will thus accelerate research across biomedical domains” says Julio Saez-Rodriguez, Head of Research, EMBL-EBI and Director of the DREAM Challenges.
“AI is rapidly advancing in biology, increasingly acting as a co-pilot for hypothesis generation and analysis. However, rigorous, open evaluation is necessary to ensure these tools are reliable,” states Luca Foschini, President of Sage Bionetworks. “Sage has long been a platform for open benchmarking and challenge-driven science across biomedical fields. BEACON builds on this proven model, offering a coordinated way to measure progress and establish trust in AI-enabled biology.”
“To advance machine learning in drug discovery, we must move beyond an obsession with algorithms and address the data gap,” says Patrick Walters, Chief Scientist at OpenADMET. “Data is the most critical component of any model, yet it is often the most overlooked. BEACON represents a concerted effort to deliver the high-quality, consistent data required to turn machine learning potential into a reality for drug discovery.”
“AI can only advance as fast as our ability to measure it. Benchmarking and critical assessment are the cornerstone of modern science and necessary for objective validating progress,” says Peng Fu, CEO of Conscience. “By coordinating community efforts with shared core values of open science, teamwork, and impact, we can establish comprehensive, adaptable frameworks that drive the development of AI and foundation models and deliver meaningful impact across the sciences.”
Conscience, together with BEACON’s founding partners, is calling on the biomedical community, including academia, industry, funders, and policymakers, to support benchmarking as the foundation for the responsible use of AI in drug discovery. BEACON will provide the infrastructure and expertise, but the consortium is calling for industry commitment and collaboration to sustain its efforts. To learn more, please visit conscience.ca/beacon.
Conscience is a non-profit focused on enabling drug discovery and development in areas where open sharing and collaboration are key to advancement towards accessible treatments. It does so by encouraging and funding the open sharing of knowledge and tools, the use and improvement of artificial intelligence, and the development of policies that break down barriers of traditional drug development. Powered by a network that includes academics, industry, technologists, policy experts, and public support, Conscience seeks to drive innovation by turning drug discovery and development into a team sport. Its open science model brings unique value in areas where market solutions are limited, offering alternatives to traditional intellectual property models to make new accessible medicines so no one is left behind. Through key initiatives, such as its DMOS (Developing Medicines through Open Science) program and CACHE (Critical Assessment of Computation Hit-finding Experiments) Challenges, Conscience is accelerating the path to treatments for those who need them most. For more information, visit conscience.ca.
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]]>The post Beyond the Competition: Insights from Returning CACHE Participants appeared first on Conscience.
]]>Through complex scientific challenges, companies and researchers can refine their technology and methodologies, improve operational workflows, and give team members hands-on experience. All of which are benefits that are easier to realize in lower-pressure environments because the work isn’t tied to a client project. In this way, these challenges become a platform for both innovation and organizational growth, helping companies develop stronger capabilities. At the same time, sharing data provides a collaborative learning opportunity that advances drug discovery for the broader community.
Molecular Forecaster is a computational chemistry company that helps companies make smarter drug design decisions. Their highly collaborative Research-as-a-Service model democratizes computer-aided drug design, with the goal of becoming the go-to partner for small molecule drug design. Molecular Forecaster has participated in all six CACHE Challenges so far, demonstrating the value and experience gained by entering multiple challenges.
“…the challenges are an excellent opportunity for our junior scientists to get valuable hands-on experience working with complex, real-world scientific problems”
“We were drawn to participate in the first CACHE Challenge for several reasons, including the fact that this is a Canadian initiative,” said Josh Pottel, Ph.D., CEO of Molecular Forecaster. “We continue to participate because the challenges are an excellent opportunity for our junior scientists to get valuable hands-on experience working with complex, real-world scientific problems. We also benefit from being able to share our data and access the data generated by others. For us, the lessons of CACHE go far beyond winning or losing; they are opportunities to learn and collaborate.”
Dr. Artem Cherkasov is a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Precision Cancer Drug Design, a professor in the Department of Urologic Sciences at the University of British Columbia, and a senior scientist at the Vancouver Prostate Centre. He also placed first in CACHE Challenge #1 and CACHE Challenge #3, using advanced computational methods and AI to identify potential new treatments for Parkinson’s disease and COVID-19, respectively.
“…now is the right time and the right place for CACHE as open science competitions like this can lead to greater opportunity for economic balance”
“We are experiencing a digital revolution in drug discovery with the help of AI,” said Dr. Cherkasov. “As a proponent of the democratization of drug discovery, now is the right time and the right place for CACHE as open science competitions like this can lead to greater opportunity for economic balance. The CACHE Challenges also allow for benchmarking in the field, which then leads to sharing and greater adoption of best practices. Plus, the competitive edge of the competitions can be beneficial and I’ve found that it encourages participation.”
Keunwan Park, Principal Researcher with the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), has also participated in four CACHE Challenges. In CACHE Challenge #4, Keunwan Park was the only participant to identify a molecule that was both bioactive and chemically novel.
“CACHE provides essential datasets and a standardized platform to evaluate performance, enabling the development of such methods”
“I believe the greatest value of CACHE lies in its community-driven approach, similar to CASP, where teams share diverse strategies to tackle the challenge of hit-finding,” said Park. “CACHE provides essential datasets and a standardized platform to evaluate performance, enabling the development of such methods. By continuously participating in challenges, we have been able to explore and refine our own workflows while learning from the varied methodologies of other teams. We expect that the valuable targets and resulting datasets provided by CACHE will play a key role in advancing more effective virtual screening and drug discovery strategies.”
Regardless of whether someone participates in one or more challenges, the benefits are invaluable. Each represents a new opportunity to learn and evaluate new methods, gain hands-on experience, and foster collaboration through data-sharing.
Through open science initiatives like the CACHE Challenges, the scientific community can drive innovation in early-stage drug discovery forward. By participating, researchers and companies collectively advance the field, refine methodologies, and generate shared knowledge that strengthens the broader drug discovery ecosystem. In this way, CACHE and similar competitions do more than accelerate individual projects, they contribute to a more collaborative, efficient, and impactful scientific community.
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]]>The post Second call for applications for expanded DMOS program includes clinical research appeared first on Conscience.
]]>We’ve already seen DMOS projects catalyze major progress from advancing rare disease therapies toward the clinic to unlocking major international funding. We’re looking forward to supporting the next wave of collaborative, open science-driven drug development.
Read the full press release below.
For more information, contact:
Estrid Jakobsen at [email protected]
Julia Smith at [email protected]
Toronto, ON, Canada, February 10, 2026 — Conscience, a Canadian non-profit dedicated to enabling drug discovery through collaboration for the advancement of accessible treatments, is pleased to announce it is accepting applications for the second round of its Developing Medicines through Open Science (DMOS) program. The program’s next round marks an important shift as it is expanding to fund clinical projects in addition to preclinical projects.
The DMOS program aims to foster collaborations that will lead to the development of drug candidates in areas of unmet medical need, establish proof of concept (POC) for an open science path to drug development, and further translate innovations into affordable medicines, while generating economic activity, and supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Canada. The total funding available for the program is $15M CAD. Funds will be awarded to projects that focus on life-threatening or severely debilitating diseases that have demonstrated strong target validation and tractability to enable clinical POC as well as projects that undertake either IND-enabling preclinical studies or human safety and efficacy studies.
“We are excited to be kicking off the second round of applications for the DMOS program. Expanding the program to support both clinical and preclinical projects underscores our commitment to delivering meaningful impact for patients,” says Anne Fortier, Vice President of Drug Discovery and Development at Conscience. “Collaboration is integral to driving advancements in drug discovery, especially in rare and neglected disease areas, and applying an open science framework to clinical-stage projects will give promising therapies the best possible chance of success in terms of accessibility and affordability.”
The DMOS funding period is two years, with the possibility of an extension. The maximum amount of funding per project that can be awarded is dependent on the project stage. Clinical stage projects can receive up to $2M CAD in funding.
To be eligible for DMOS funding, applicants must meet the following criteria:
Interested applicants can learn more about the program and application process here. Proposals are accepted on a rolling basis.
Three recipients of the inaugural round of the DMOS program were announced in February 2025. Their projects are focussed on identifying treatments and cures for three rare diseases: a genetic neuromuscular disorder, a pediatric brain cancer (Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma), and a liver disease. In December 2025, Agora Open Science Trust announced the nomination of M4K2009 as the lead development candidate for its M4K Pharma program, which applies open science to drive the development of an affordable treatment for Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma. The selection of M4K2009 represents a significant scientific and organizational milestone, and demonstrates the benefit of collaborative programs like DMOS that enable the development of more accessible and affordable treatments.
Another collaborative translational research project on Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis (PSC), led by Dr. Sonya MacParland at University Health Network, was selected for funding by the European Rare Diseases Research Alliance (ERDERA) in 2025. This achievement illustrates how DMOS funding can catalyze further investment, amplify impact, and position Canadian researchers at the forefront of global efforts to address rare diseases.
Additional Quotes
“Open science has the power to accelerate the discovery and development of new, accessible treatments for Canadians. Through initiatives like the DMOS program, the Government of Canada is supporting innovative collaborations that bring together researchers, businesses, and communities to tackle unmet medical needs and drive economic growth.”
– The Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Industry and Minister responsible for Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions.
Conscience is a non-profit focused on enabling drug discovery and development in areas where open sharing and collaboration are key to advancement towards accessible treatments. It does so by encouraging and funding the open sharing of knowledge and tools, the use and improvement of artificial intelligence, and the development of policies that break down barriers of traditional drug development. Powered by a network that includes academics, industry, technologists, policy experts, and public support, Conscience seeks to drive innovation by turning drug discovery and development into a team sport. Its open science model brings unique value in areas where market solutions are limited, offering alternatives to traditional intellectual property models to make new accessible medicines so no one is left behind. Through key initiatives, such as its DMOS (Developing Medicines through Open Science) program and CACHE (Critical Assessment of Computation Hit-finding Experiments) Challenges, Conscience is accelerating the path to treatments for those who need them most. For more information, visit conscience.ca.
The Developing Medicines through Open Science (DMOS) program supports drug development in areas of unmet medical needs where open sharing and collaboration are key to advancement towards accessible treatments. Using an open science model, the program aims to foster collaborations that undertake preclinical and clinical work to develop drug candidates in areas of unmet medical need, establish proof of concept (POC) for an open science path to drug development and further translate innovations into affordable medicines, generate economic activity, and support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Canada. With total funding of $15M CAD, this program supports projects focused on life-threatening or severely debilitating diseases that have demonstrated strong target validation and tractability to enable clinical proof of concept and undertake either IND-enabling preclinical studies or human safety and efficacy studies. To learn more about the program, including eligibility criteria, please visit the website.
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]]>The post Agora Open Science Trust selects lead development candidate for pediatric brain cancer therapy appeared first on Conscience.
]]>For more information, contact:
Estrid Jakobsen at [email protected]
Sofia Melliou at [email protected]
Toronto, ON, Canada – December 8, 2025 – Agora Open Science Trust today announced the nomination of M4K2009 as the lead development candidate for its M4K Pharma program, which applies open science to drive the development of an affordable treatment for Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma (DIPG), a rare and devastating pediatric brain cancer. Nominating a lead development candidate marks the point where a discovery program selects a single molecule with the highest potential to advance further towards human clinical trials. The selection of M4K2009 represents a significant scientific and organizational milestone.
The nomination follows an extensive, multi-year research collaboration with several academic and industry partners worldwide. Among the hundreds of compounds designed and evaluated, M4K2009 demonstrated excellent potency, selectivity, brain penetration, and tolerability in preclinical models, establishing it as a strong candidate for further development.
“Our nomination of M4K2009 represents an important milestone for open science drug discovery,” said Max Morgan, CEO of Agora Open Science Trust. “By pooling resources, foregoing patents and secrecy, and instead working openly and collaboratively across institutions with complementary capabilities and expertise, our team has now shown that open science is capable of delivering high-quality, clinically viable candidates, particularly in areas of market failure underserved by traditional proprietary approaches.”
With financial and in-kind support from the Krembil Foundation, Conscience’s Developing Medicines through Open Science (DMOS) program, OICR’s Cancer Therapeutics Innovation Pipeline (CTIP), Charles River Laboratories, Structural Genomics Consortium, Institute of Cancer Research, University of Pennsylvania, Montreal Children’s Hospital/McGill University, CAMH, Children’s Cancer Institute, Sant Joan de Deu Hospital, Reaction Biology, GL Chemtec and The Brain Tumour Charity, M4K Pharma has made critical strides toward realizing an affordable, first-in-class therapy for children affected by DIPG.
Conscience’s DMOS program, which is supported by a grant from the Government of Canada’s Strategic Innovation Fund, enables collaborative preclinical drug discovery in areas where open sharing and collaboration are key to advancement towards accessible treatments, such as rare and neglected diseases. Participating projects which include at least one Canadian SME, use an open science approach as they foster collaboration for pre-clinical work, demonstrate early proof-of-concept research, and ultimately translate innovation into affordable medicine and better health outcomes globally. The inaugural round of the program launched in February 2025, with the Agora Open Science Trust as one of the recipients.
“M4K Pharma’s lead development candidate nomination represents a significant step in advancing the program toward the clinical stage and demonstrates that an open science approach can bring us closer to meaningful treatments for rare diseases like DIPG,” says Anne Fortier, VP drug discovery and development at Conscience. “Through the DMOS program, we’re proud to support rigorous, collaborative work that helps make therapies more accessible and affordable, particularly in areas where few solutions currently exist.”
“Canada is proud to support open science collaborations that deliver real hope for children and families facing rare diseases like DIPG. The nomination of M4K2009 as a lead candidate reflects the power of Canadian innovation and partnership. By accelerating the development of affordable and accessible therapies, we are not only advancing research, but strengthening our position as a global leader in health innovation for the benefit of all Canadians,” said The Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Industry and Minister responsible for Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions.
By sharing data and results with the research community and firmly committing to Agora’s charitable mission of achieving affordable access for affected children, the M4K Pharma program has been successful in motivating and aligning a broad range of contributors. The program has crowdsourced inputs from leading experts and reduced costs and duplication of effort across ALK2 drug discovery research for DIPG, and demonstrated that open science can achieve breakthroughs in areas that traditional, closed models often overlook.
For more information, visit https://m4kpharma.com or https://agoraopensciencetrust.org.
Agora Open Science Trust is a Canadian charity whose mission is to accelerate the discovery and development of affordable new medicines through open science. Agora’s first initiative – M4K Pharma (‘Medicines for Kids’) – is using open science to drive preclinical and clinical development of a novel ALK2 inhibitor for the treatment of Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma (DIPG), a rare pediatric brain cancer. Agora’s pipeline of collaborative open science drug discovery programs has recently expanded to include programs for Spinal Bulbar Muscular Atrophy (SBMA), a rare genetic neuromuscular disorder, and Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis (PSC), a rare liver disease — both of which currently have no approved treatment.
Agora continues to welcome collaborative funding partners whose support will help advance M4K2009 into clinical evaluation and sustain its mission to develop affordable medicines through open science. You can support its mission at https://www.agoraopensciencetrust.org/donate-to-our-mission.
M4K Pharma is an open science drug development company wholly owned by Agora Open Science Trust. Agora incorporated M4K Pharma to pursue commercial development of the ALK2 clinical candidate arising from its collaborative DIPG research program. M4K Pharma is tasked with leveraging regulatory exclusivity rights and priority review voucher assets to attract late-stage commercial investment and partnerships focused on achieving affordable access to a clinically validated ALK2 inhibitor. Any M4K Pharma profits from these commercial efforts will be distributed to the Agora charity to support DIPG patient access initiatives and further open science research programs.
Conscience is a non-profit focused on enabling drug discovery and development in areas where open sharing and collaboration are key to advancement towards accessible treatments. It does so by encouraging and funding the open sharing of knowledge and tools, the use and improvement of artificial intelligence, and the development of policies that break down barriers of traditional drug development. Powered by a network that includes academics, industry, technologists, policy experts, and public support, Conscience seeks to drive innovation by turning drug discovery and development into a team sport. Its open science model brings unique value in areas where market solutions are limited, offering alternatives to traditional intellectual property models to make new accessible medicines so no one is left behind. Through key initiatives, such as its DMOS (Developing Medicines through Open Science) program and CACHE (Critical Assessment of Computation Hit-finding Experiments) Challenges, Conscience is accelerating the path to treatments for those who need them most. For more information, visit conscience.ca.
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]]>The post Conscience and Every Cure launch partnership to advance drug repurposing appeared first on Conscience.
]]>This collaboration brings together two mission-aligned organizations united by a shared commitment to making treatments more accessible and the belief that openness and collaboration are essential to getting there. By combining Conscience’s network and funding mechanisms (through the Developing Medicines through Open Science and Open Science Advisory Services programs) with Every Cure’s expertise and track-record in identifying promising medicine–disease matches, we will work together to find and co-fund projects to bring repurposed treatments to patients faster.
Drug repurposing is one of the most impactful ways to reduce time, cost, and risk in bringing new treatments to patients, especially for diseases that are underfunded or overlooked. Every Cure uses several AI-powered approaches to create a ranked list of repurposing opportunities including knowledge-graph-based, LLM-based, and real-world evidence-based approaches. They are actively pursuing nine repurposing programs across a range of conditions, from ultrarare to more common, all with high unmet medical needs. Every Cure’s co-founder and president, Dr. David Fajgenbaum, has previously identified and advanced 14 repurposed treatments, including one that saved his own life and others with his disease. Every Cure builds on that foundation of expertise to help more patients worldwide through scalable, AI-driven discovery and collaboration.
Every Cure’s efforts are well aligned with Conscience’s mission to enable drug discovery and development of new medicines in Canada through collaboration and open science. Through this partnership, we will identify cross-border projects that are both scientifically promising and mission-aligned, leveraging Conscience’s growing network of Canadian experts, research organizations, and CROs to find the right collaborators to help advance these projects. Together, we aim to build collaborations that bring the best of both sides of the border to accelerate new treatments for patients.
If you are a Canadian researcher or company with an idea for repurposing a drug, or you are interested in being part of a repurposing project, please contact Conscience. We want to hear from you.
For more information, please reach out to [email protected] or visit everycure.org.

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