Insilico Open-sources DORA on GitHub, supported by Microsoft Azure, transforming scientific research and content creation with multi-agent LLMs

InSilico Medicine

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Jan 8, 2026 – Insilico Medicine (3696.HK), a clinical-stage drug discovery and development company driven by generative artificial intelligence (AI), today announced the launch of DORA Community Edition, a free, self-hostable version of its comprehensive AI platform for Scientific Research and Content Creation. Initiated by Insilico and supported by Microsoft, DORA Community Edition aims to democratize access to state-of-the-art research tools, foster global collaboration, enhance transparency of scientific research, and accelerate innovation across biotechnology and academic landscapes.

In an era of rapid scientific advancement, the process of documenting research—from scientific and literature reviews to patent applications and business reports—can be a time-consuming task.

DORA emerged alongside the rise of LLM applications in July 2024. Developed by Insilico, it is an advanced Agentic AI-driven tool designed to streamline the drafting of academic papers and other research-related documents. It helps researchers create a variety of professional-grade documents and provide accurate references using a team of agile AI agents, engineered prompts, pre-designed content-generation workflows and Insilico's proprietary databases.

The company recently completed a new upgrade to DORA’s capabilities, supported by Microsoft and powered by Microsoft Foundry. These upgrades enable DORA to seamlessly integrate with various Foundry models, including the top-tier O3 Deep Research, significantly enhancing the tool’s research efficiency and quality.

The upcoming DORA Community Edition will be available under the permissive Apache 2.0 license, offering business-friendly terms for use and modification. Developers and researchers worldwide can get started with Open-Source DORA by accessing the code on GitHub: https://github.com/insilicomedicine/DORA

"We believe that the future of scientific discovery lies in collaboration, not isolation," said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, Founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine. "By open-sourcing DORA, we are placing powerful AI tools directly into the hands of innovators everywhere. Our hope is to build a vibrant ecosystem where the community can collectively enhance research integrity, push the boundaries of what's possible in biotechnology, and ultimately bring life-saving therapies to patients faster."

“Microsoft is committed to working with partners and customers to enable and accelerate scientific discoveries that benefit people, organizations, and industries around the world,” said Elena Bonfiglioli, General Manager of Global Healthcare and Life Science at Microsoft, “We are excited to support Insilico in open sourcing DORA.  “By helping researchers search, organize, and synthesize complex scientific information, DORA lowers barriers to cutting-edge research and expands access to generative AI. As a partner in the Microsoft Discovery preview, we are working together with Insilico to enable deeper scientific collaboration and supporting customers in applying AI to deliver meaningful, human-centered impact.”

In addition to DORA Community Edition, Insilico offers a more comprehensive version of DORA (SaaS) for users requiring advanced, specialized capabilities. Compared to the open-source version, DORA SaaS provides access to pre-analyzed protein–disease association reports within Insilico’s target discovery engine, PandaOmics, enabling deeper, domain-specific insights. It is also connected to Insilico’s Data Warehouse, supporting instant in-text citations. Additionally, DORA SaaS features a more extensive library of pre-designed templates to support the creation of diverse scientific content. Users can also access and deploy DORA SaaS directly through the Microsoft Marketplace.

In 2016, Insilico first described the concept of using generative AI for designing novel molecules in a peer-reviewed journal, laying the foundation for the commercially available Pharma.AI platform. Since then, Insilico has continued to integrate technical breakthroughs into the Pharma.AI platform, which is now a generative AI-powered solution encompassing biology, chemistry, medicine development, and scientific research.

Recently, Insilico hosted the Winter Edition of its Pharma.AI webinar, unveiling the latest updates to its software portfolio, introducing MMAI Gym for LLM training, and outlining its vision for advancing toward pharmaceutical super-intelligence. Fill in this form for on-demand access.

By integrating the technologies of AI and automation, Insilico has demonstrated a significant efficiency boost compared to traditional drug discovery methods (often requiring 2.5-4 years), as announced in the recent key timeline benchmarks for internal DC programs from 2021 to 2024: the average time to DC is 12-18 months, with 60-200 molecules synthesized and tested per program.

 

About Insilico Medicine

Insilico Medicine is a pioneering global biotechnology company dedicated to integrating artificial intelligence and automation technologies to accelerate drug discovery, drive innovation in the life sciences, and extend healthy longevity to people on the planet. The company was listed on the Main Board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on December 30, 2025, under the stock code 03696.HK.

By integrating AI and automation technologies and deep in-house drug discovery capabilities, Insilico is delivering innovative drug solutions for unmet needs including fibrosis, oncology, immunology, pain, and obesity and metabolic disorders. Additionally, Insilico extends the reach of Pharma.AI across diverse industries, such as advanced materials, agriculture, nutritional products and veterinary medicine. For more information, please visit www.insilico.com

Doing good pays off: Environmentally and socially responsible companies drive value and market efficiency

Based on a global study of 2,636 firms across 31 countries, researchers from Kyushu University provide scientific evidence of the economic benefits of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices

Kyushu University

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Beyond traditional financial information, corporate ESG practices—such as carbon emissions, wastewater management, and employee diversity—have become increasingly critical factors for investors. Findings from Kyushu University indicate that stronger ESG disclosure and performance can increase both a firm’s intrinsic value and overall market efficiency.

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Credit: Kyushu University

Fukuoka, Japan—This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI), launched with United Nations backing in 2006. Today, environmental, social, and governance (ESG) related non-financial information—such as greenhouse gas emissions, pollution control, and diversity metrics—is routinely analyzed alongside traditional financial data.

As companies scale up their ESG commitments, core questions remain: do these efforts create extra value, and how do they affect capital markets?

A study published on January 8, 2026, in Business Strategy and the Environment offers new evidence from researchers at Kyushu University. The team finds that strengthening ESG disclosure and performance increases both a firm’s intrinsic value and overall market efficiency.

“We focus on firms’ intrinsic value, as it goes beyond short-term metrics like costs and profits to include future opportunities and risks,” explains Xinyu Wang, a PhD student at Kyushu University’s Graduate School of Economics and the paper’s first author. “This offers a more stable measure of long-term value, which aligns with ESG’s vision of sustainable value creation and a resilient global financial system.”

Drawing on a global dataset spanning 2015 to 2022, the team analyzed 2,636 firms across 31 countries on six continents. The sample included companies from manufacturing, raw materials, services, ICT, and other sectors.

To assess intrinsic value, the researchers applied the Residual Income Model (RIM), which incorporates a company’s book value and excess earnings. Based on this, they calculated misvaluation, as the ratio of intrinsic value to market capitalization, capturing how far stock prices deviate from their true worth.

The findings confirm that stronger ESG disclosure and performance correspond to higher intrinsic value, with ESG performance having a larger effect than disclosure alone.

“These results align with our theoretical analysis,” says Wang. “For instance, signaling theory suggests that ESG disclosure reduces information asymmetry and perceived risk. Agency theory indicates that strong ESG performance often reflects more effective internal governance, strengthening trust among key stakeholders, including investors, customers, and employees.”

“Investors care not only about the quantity of information, but also its quality,” adds Jun Xie, Assistant Professor at Kyushu University’s Urban Institute and a co-author of the study. “This highlights the need for companies to communicate their substantive progress honestly, rather than relying on promotional, greenwash-like messaging.”

Beyond increasing intrinsic value, higher ESG practices also bring a firm’s market price closer to its intrinsic value, correcting both overvaluation bubbles and undervaluation. By addressing information gaps that may mislead investors, ESG efforts enable stock prices to reflect firms’ fundamental values more promptly and accurately, thereby enhancing capital market efficiency.

At a global level, however, ESG’s impact is uneven. The effects are more pronounced in advanced economies, while remaining limited in developing ones.

With the upcoming adoption of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) sustainability disclosure system, publicly listed companies will be required to report ESG information under a unified framework. The researchers hope that broader implementation of standardized rules will expand the dataset to support more thorough cross-firm comparisons going forward.

“While creating economic, social, and environmental value, companies are also major consumers of resources and emitters of pollutants. Thus, ensuring a sustainable future requires shifting corporate actions toward sustainable practices,” says Professor Hidemichi Fujii from Kyushu University’s Faculty of Economics, Wang’s academic supervisor. “Our goal is to provide scientific evidence by objectively clarifying the impact of ESG factors. We aim to contribute to policies that transform corporate practices based on these findings.”

Wang extends this perspective to the broader financial system, where ideally, information in capital markets should flow without distortion. “Research is only a vehicle,” she reflects. “What I look forward to is a more efficient and sustainable world. A better understanding of ESG can help guide both markets and society toward that direction.”

Researchers at Kyushu University conducted a detailed theoretical analysis to explain how ESG disclosure and performance influence a firm’s intrinsic value and market efficiency through different mechanisms. While signaling theory suggests that disclosure reduces information asymmetry for investors, stakeholder theory and others highlight how strong ESG performance can enhance a firm’s reputation.

Credit

Kyushu University

For more information about this research, see “Environmental, Social, and Governance Factors as Tools for Improving Market Efficiency: A Study on Equity Misevaluation,” Xinyu Wang, Siyu Shen, Jun Xie, Hidemichi Fujii, Alexander Ryota Keeley, Shunsuke Managi, Business Strategy and the Environment, https://doi.org/10.1002/bse.70486

About Kyushu University 
Founded in 1911, Kyushu University is one of Japan's leading research-oriented institutions of higher education, consistently ranking as one of the top ten Japanese universities in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings and the QS World Rankings. Located in Fukuoka, on the island of Kyushu—the most southwestern of Japan’s four main islands—Kyushu U sits in a coastal metropolis frequently ranked among the world’s most livable cities and historically known as Japan’s gateway to Asia. Its multiple campuses are home to around 19,000 students and 8,000 faculty and staff. Through its VISION 2030, Kyushu U will “drive social change with integrative knowledge.” By fusing the spectrum of knowledge, from the humanities and arts to engineering and medical sciences, Kyushu U will strengthen its research in the key areas of decarbonization, medicine and health, and environment and food, to tackle society’s most pressing issues.

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Journal

Business Strategy and the Environment

DOI

10.1002/bse.70486 

Method of Research

Data/statistical analysis

Subject of Research

Not applicable

Article Title

Environmental, Social, and Governance Factors as Tools for Improving Market Efficiency: A Study on Equity Misevaluation

Article Publication Date

8-Jan-2026

 

Victoria’s Secret grant backs cutting-edge ovarian cancer research

University of Virginia Health System

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Promising ovarian cancer research by Melanie Rutkowski, PhD, at the University of Virginia Comprehensive Cancer Center has won $700,000 in support from the Victoria’s Secret Global Fund for Women’s Cancers in partnership with Pelotonia and AACR, the American Association for Cancer Research.

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Credit: UVA Communications

Promising ovarian cancer research by Melanie Rutkowski, PhD, at the University of Virginia Comprehensive Cancer Center has won $700,000 in support from the Victoria’s Secret Global Fund for Women’s Cancers in partnership with Pelotonia and AACR, the American Association for Cancer Research.

Rutkowski has been selected as a Victoria’s Secret Rising Innovator, receiving a Research Grant in partnership with Pelotonia and AACR to further her studies of the role of the microbiome – the collection of microorganisms that live within us – in ovarian cancer and in the disease’s stubborn ability to resist immune therapy. Her work is shedding important light on understanding why ovarian cancer is so difficult to treat with immune therapies and could lead to better treatments to improve patient outcomes.

“It is such a tremendous honor to be selected as one of the recipients for the Victoria’s Secret Global Fund for Women’s Cancer Rising Innovator Research Grant,” said Rutkowski, part of the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology at the UVA School of Medicine. “Most studies focus on how tumor cells drive resistance to immune therapy. Our lab has identified a pathway that is driven by our immune cells when they recognize commensal bacteria. However, we do not fully understand why these interactions have such a negative effect on the immune system.”

The Microbiome and Ovarian Cancer

The three-year grant will support Rutkowski’s investigations into how faulty cellular signaling undercuts the body’s ability to detect and fight off ovarian cancer. She has found that bacteria in the gut interact with particular immune cells to suppress the body’s immune response. This ultimately leads to the failure of immunotherapies designed to bolster that immune response and help the body destroy the cancer cells.

With the Victoria’s Secret grant money, Rutkowski aims to better understand how chronic exposure to the microbiome affects immune cells and the “microenvironment” that surrounds ovarian tumors. This microenvironment includes immune cells, blood vessels and other substances that can, collectively, either encourage or stifle cancer growth.

Rutkowski hopes her work will lead to ways to counter the effects of the faulty cellular signaling and, ultimately, enhance the effectiveness of immunotherapy for ovarian cancer.

“This grant will help us understand how and why these interactions lead to immune therapy failure, moving us a step closer to developing novel therapeutic interventions that enhance the immune system’s ability to kill cancer cells for patients with ovarian cancer,” Rutkowski said. “Outcomes for ovarian cancer are dismal, and immune therapy has the potential to offer a significant therapeutic benefit if we could figure out how to block the central pathways that drive resistance. The goal will be to use the discoveries from this award to eventually develop a novel immune therapy that can reinvigorate the immune system and ultimately improve outcomes for ovarian cancer.”

About the Grant

The Victoria’s Secret Fund for Women’s Cancers Rising Innovator Research Grant, in partnership with Pelotonia and AACR, supports midcareer scientists performing innovative research in breast and gynecological cancers. It seeks to foster innovation in the understanding, prevention, early detection, diagnosis and treatment of these cancers, with the goal of improving outcomes and eliminating cancer health disparities. The latest class of grant recipients is available on the AACR’s website.

Finding new and better ways to treat the most complex and challenging diseases is a primary mission for UVA’s new Paul and Diane Manning Institute of Biotechnology. The institute aims to accelerate how quickly lab discoveries can be translated into lifesaving new treatments for patients.

UVA’s commitment to enhancing the effectiveness of cancer immunotherapy – and the institution’s long history of success with therapeutic applications for focused ultrasound – have also prompted UVA Health to launch the world’s first Focused Ultrasound Cancer Immunotherapy Center. The center is exploring how combining immunotherapy with focused sound waves could improve immunotherapy effectiveness and revolutionize care for many different cancers.

To keep up with the latest medical research news from UVA, subscribe to the Making of Medicine blog at http://makingofmedicine.virginia.edu.

Promising ovarian cancer research by Melanie Rutkowski, PhD, at the University of Virginia Comprehensive Cancer Center has won $700,000 in support from the Victoria’s Secret Global Fund for Women’s Cancers in partnership with Pelotonia and AACR, the American Association for Cancer Research.

Promising ovarian cancer research by Melanie Rutkowski, PhD, at the University of Virginia Comprehensive Cancer Center has won $700,000 in support from the Victoria’s Secret Global Fund for Women’s Cancers in partnership with Pelotonia and AACR, the American Association for Cancer Research.

Credit

UVA Communications