Investing.com -- Amazon's cloud division introduced Amazon Bio Discovery on Tuesday, an artificial intelligence application designed to accelerate early-stage drug development by enabling scientists to execute complex computational workflows without coding.

Amazon Web Services stated in a blog post that Amazon Bio Discovery provides researchers with access to a library of specialized biological foundation models capable of generating and evaluating potential drug molecules. The platform includes an AI agent that assists users in selecting models, setting parameters and interpreting results.

Researchers can submit shortlisted candidates to integrated laboratory partners for synthesis and testing, with results fed back into the system to inform subsequent design iterations.

Rajiv Chopra, vice president of healthcare AI and life sciences at AWS, said the process that previously required 18 months to produce 300 potential drug candidates can now be completed within weeks.

Chopra noted that the proliferation of drug-discovery models has created a shortage of computational biologists who can convert laboratory objectives into machine-learning pipelines.

AWS reported that Bayer, the Broad Institute and Voyager Therapeutics are among early adopters. The company stated that 19 of the top 20 global pharmaceutical companies currently use its cloud services.

AWS will provide a free trial with five experimental units before launching subscription tiers.

At AWS's Life Science Symposium, AWS, Boston Consulting Group and Merck will present an AI platform designed to improve clinical trial site selection.