Anthropic is running its own drug programs and has bought one-person biotech Mithril Medicine

Anthropic said on October 27 that it has started drug discovery of its own, including programs for rare childhood forms of muscular dystrophy, and that it has acquired Mithril Medicine, a one-person company developing treatments for two rare forms of the disease. Per Anthropic, its founder, Cody Tranbarger, used Claude to handle contracts, logistics and much of the other work.

THE PARTNERS

Anthropic says its scientists have spent several months in research partnerships with six organizations developing medicines: BigHat Biosciences, Bristol Myers Squibb, Divergence Labs, Enveda, Generate Biomedicines and The Column Group. It says it plans to scale the work up substantially.

WHAT ANTHROPIC REPORTS SO FAR

Generate Biomedicines' scientists used Claude Code to redesign part of a CAR T-cell therapy. One design was about 70% shorter than the standard version and, in lab tests, let immune cells make roughly ten times as many receptors. At Divergence Labs, which is working on food allergies, Claude generated roughly 35,000 antibody designs in about a month, and early tests found hits for both parts of the planned drug. These are early lab results reported by Anthropic and its partners, with technical reports and preprints linked from the post.

WHY IT MATTERS FOR CLAUDE

Anthropic says the programs show where its models are strong and weak across drug-development work, and that it has already prioritized specific model improvements based on what it learned.

WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW

What Anthropic paid for Mithril, and when any of these programs could reach human trials.