Anthropic acquires Mithril Medicine and starts its own drug research

Anthropic says it has acquired Mithril Medicine, a one-person company developing treatments for two rare forms of muscular dystrophy, and begun running drug discovery programs itself. Founder Cody Tranbarger is continuing the research at Anthropic and plans to start additional programs. Anthropic says Tranbarger used Claude to coordinate contracts, logistics and experiments with 11 external labs, taking a possible treatment from an idea to promising mouse results in less than 18 months. The acquisition accompanies research partnerships with six organizations spanning molecule design, manufacturing documentation and clinical trial planning. Most of the work remains preclinical; Anthropic expects a drug could be ready for human trials as soon as late 2028 if candidates continue to hold up.