Eravacycline, an antibacterial drug, repurposed for pancreatic cancer therapy: insights from a molecular-based deep learning model

Background Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) remains a serious threat to health, with limited effective therapeutic options, especially due to advanced stage at diagnosis and its inherent resistance to chemotherapy, making it one of the leading causes of cancer-related deaths worldwide. The lack of clear treatment directions underscores the urgent need for innovative approaches to address and manage this deadly condition. In this research, we repurpose drugs with potential anti-cancer activity using machine learning (ML). Methods We tackle the problem by using a neural network trained on drug–target interaction information enriched with drug–drug interaction information, which has not been used for anti-cancer drug repurposing before. We focus on eravacycline, an antibacterial drug, which was selected and evaluated to assess its anti-cancer effects. Results Eravacycline significantly inhibited the proliferation and migration of BxPC-3 cells and induced apoptosis. Conclusion Our study highlights the potential of drug repurposing for cancer treatment using ML. Eravacycline showed promising results in inhibiting cancer cell proliferation, migration and inducing apoptosis in PDAC. These findings demonstrate that our developed ML drug repurposing models can be applied to a wide range of new oncology therapeutics, to identify potential anti-cancer agents. This highlights the potential and presents a promising approach for identifying new therapeutic options.