ION CHANNEL DRUG SCREENING
Systematic, high-throughput screening across a broad panel of voltage-gated ion channels and human, mouse and rat cell-line resources—designed to reveal pharmacological effects beyond conventional targeted panels.
*Turnaround depends on panel configuration, assay design, controls, replication and analysis requirements.
FROM BIOLOGY TO EVIDENCE
*Turnaround and coverage depend on the agreed channel panel, assay design, controls and replication.
SERVICES
The service portfolio is organized around six interconnected capabilities rather than isolated assays.
Broad VGIC screening, custom channel panels, selectivity profiling and off-target profiling using standardized automated electrophysiology workflows.
Detailed characterization of wild-type and variant channels under controlled experimental conditions.
A broad collection of stable ion-channel cell resources plus development of customer-defined variants.
Transform standardized raw electrophysiology into experimentally constrained computational ion-channel models.
Machine-readable electrophysiology with automated analysis and provenance from summary result to source recording.
Connect new experiments with structured ion-channel knowledge, reference kinetics and published pharmacology.
SCREENING WORKFLOW
Compounds, concentrations, channel coverage, controls and assay conditions.
Standardized automated patch-clamp measurements across the agreed panel.
Raw recordings and metadata organized into standardized HDF5-based datasets.
Automated QC, feature extraction and detailed channel-specific analysis.
Secure web access from compound/channel summaries down to individual recordings.
CELL RESOURCES
IonScreen builds on a collection of approximately 300 stable cell lines overexpressing human, mouse and rat ion-channel genes. The resource can support screening, reference characterization, licensing discussions and development of new variants.
Broad VGIC and related ion-channel resources developed for standardized electrophysiology.
Generate customer-defined variants and compare their electrophysiological phenotype with the corresponding wild type.
Assess whether mutations alter compound sensitivity or other pharmacological responses.
Prepared cell workflows designed to reduce cell-culture constraints in electrophysiology campaigns.
LITERATURE + EXPERIMENT
AI-assisted screening identifies relevant reports of drug effects across ion channels and extracts structured experimental context with links back to supporting literature.
Standardized experimental screening measures compound effects across the agreed channel panel with traceability to the underlying electrophysiology.
AI-assisted literature outputs should retain publication provenance and be reviewed as evidence extraction, not treated as proof that an interaction does or does not exist.
WHY IONSCREEN
IonScreen builds on more than a decade of ion-channel research and technology development conducted at EPFL as part of the Blue Brain Project. This work established the cell resources, standardized electrophysiology workflows, datasets, analysis tools and knowledge infrastructure that form the scientific foundation for IonScreen. The timeline below traces this research journey and its transition toward an integrated ion-channel platform.
Research foundation: EPFL · Blue Brain Project
Channelpedia was developed to organize ion-channel knowledge, experimental data, metadata and computational models in a structured and accessible resource. Bringing these sources together also highlighted a fundamental problem: comprehensive, standardized electrophysiological data were still missing for many ion channels.
Automated patch-clamp electrophysiology was combined with standardized experimental protocols, structured data formats and reproducible analysis workflows, establishing a foundation for systematic comparison of many ion channels under controlled conditions.
A systematic workflow was established to characterize Kv-channel biophysics using standardized electrophysiological protocols at 15°C, 25°C and 35°C, enabling direct comparison of channel kinetics under controlled experimental conditions.
The systematic characterization workflow was extended to inward-rectifier (Kir) and two-pore-domain (K2P) potassium channels, broadening the experimental resource across functionally distinct potassium-channel families.
HCN channels were systematically characterized using standardized electrophysiology, enabling direct comparison of kinetic properties across mammalian isoforms, species and experimental temperatures.
The standardized workflow was extended to the Nav family, generating comparable electrophysiological measurements and kinetic parameters across voltage-gated sodium channels.
Systematic characterization was expanded to the Cav family, further extending standardized electrophysiological coverage across the major voltage-gated ion-channel families.
Two complementary evidence streams emerged: systematic experimental screening and structured extraction of published drug–channel evidence.
An AI-assisted workflow (ChannelAID) was developed to screen published literature for reported effects of a given compound across ion channels and organize retrieved evidence into structured drug–channel effect maps with links back to supporting publications and experimental context.
With broad cell-line resources, automated electrophysiology and standardized analysis in place, a proof-of-concept program profiled 15 compounds across the major voltage-gated ion-channel families, demonstrating the feasibility of broad, systematic Channelome pharmacology.
The next step is to bring cell resources, automated electrophysiology, comprehensive screening, standardized data, automated analysis, computational modeling and structured knowledge together as one integrated platform—connecting published evidence with what can be measured systematically in the laboratory. Hence, IonScreen is being developed as an emerging EPFL spin-off initiative to translate this research foundation into an integrated ion-channel platform for drug discovery and ion channel research.
SCIENTIFIC FOUNDATION
ABOUT
IonScreen is an emerging EPFL spin-off initiative building on ion-channel research and technology developed at EPFL through the Blue Brain Project, with the aim of translating this scientific foundation into an integrated platform for drug discovery and ion channel research.
Rajnish Ranjan, PhD
Founder, IonScreen
Ion-channel electrophysiology · Channelome profiling · Biophysics
We are engaging with pharmaceutical, biotechnology, instrumentation and research partners interested in ion-channel profiling, cell resources, assay development and platform collaboration.
rajnish@ionscreen.chLausanne, Switzerland