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On October 27, 2026, Anthropic’s Science team published a research post on early progress using Claude in drug development. Over recent months it partnered with six organizations—BigHat Biosciences, Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS), Divergence Labs, Enveda, Generate Biomedicines, and The Column Group (TCG)—and began internal discovery work. Anthropic frames the update as early-stage learning, not approved medicines. Related reading: Anthropic Used Claude to Formally Verify 123 Open-Source Libraries.

Partner notes (per Anthropic)

  1. Generate — modality engineering. Generate is reworking CAR T-cell genetic instructions for solid-tumor aims. Six scientists used Claude Code; one design was about 70% shorter than the standard version, with partner lab tests (as summarized) reporting higher receptor output and stronger cell-killing—lab claims, not regulatory approvals.
  1. Divergence — hit generation. For a two-armed food-allergy antibody approach, Claude produced roughly 35,000 designs in about a month. Early tests found “hits” on both arms; next steps include combining them.
  1. BigHat — lead optimization. With Claude on BigHat’s lab data system, the lab made and tested about 1,010 variants in about 10 weeks, reporting tighter binding and better stability metrics on the best versions versus starting leads.
  1. Enveda — manufacturing and filings. Enveda connected manufacturing documents to Claude (tests on 1,061 pages) and used Claude for first drafts of two regulatory filings, cutting review time in the reported tests. This is paperwork support, not an efficacy claim.
  1. TCG — Pleiades. TCG is establishing Pleiades to run more complex programs with Claude; a first target-assessment skill was evaluated on 45 target–disease pairs.
  1. BMS — clinical planning. BMS uses Claude to assess early clinical plans and success likelihood, with expansion planned for 2027—planning support, not trial success.

Mithril Medicine

Anthropic acquired Mithril Medicine (rare muscular dystrophy directions). Founder Cody Tranbarger used Claude to organize contracts, logistics, and experiments with 11 external labs. One program reached promising mouse results in under 18 months. If candidates hold, the post says human trials may be ready to start as early as late 2028—trial preparation, not an approved drug.

Stage caveat

Anthropic states that all of this research is still early and mostly preclinical—for the most part not yet testing drugs in humans.

See also Anthropic Uses Claude to Shrink Code's Attack Surface, Finding 493 Issues in 25 Projects and Anthropic Assesses Mythos 5 Overreach in UK AISI Cyber Testing.

This site has not participated in these partner programs or independently verified the lab or mouse results. Prefer Anthropic’s research post for the public record. For reference only.