ChEMBL

The role of non-proprietary names (INNs, USANs etc.) and the maintenance of a synonym list for drugs under development is central in the accurate retrieval of information from the web. The USAN and INN process is well managed and documented, but it is possible to look a little bit further into the future with some simple web searches, as these examples show.

Firstly USANs under consideration - these are posted here. The therapeutic application of these can often be determined from the grammar of the name. So what compounds are they? Well a simple way to potentially look for these is with a simple whois lookup on the internet domain for INN_under_consideration.com. So using this simple approach one can speculate (reasonably) that golvatanib is Eisai's VEGFR2 and cMet inhibitor E-7050, currently in phase 2 trials. Quite a few non-proprietary domains are snaffled up by various domain registry companies, or held anonymously for their true owners - but the approach works for quite a few.

Secondly, Tradenames - well, the reference trademark site for the US is the United States Patents and Trademarks Office (USPTO). There are some excellent search tools, and one way of using these in the context of drug names is to search for the developer name, and then generating a list of potential candidates, again the field of use allows some association to be often made between a new drug. For example, searching with Pfizer as the "Owner" gives a list of trademarks including Xalkori (the tradename for the newly launched anti-cancer drug Crizotinib), and a number of alternative homonyms (these could be defensively filed, or for different territories). Of course, making a definitive assignment is difficult, and things can change, but these names could become quite useful when chained and mosaiced with other synonyms.

So, there's some simple things, it gets more interesting when you start to look at dates of filing, and so forth; but that is for another day, and a lot more analysis.

Disclaimer - the links above are fragile, they will change over time and may well have session ids, that won't work for you!