Recent Advances in Peptide Drug Discovery: Novel Strategies and Targeted Protein Degradation

Recent advancements in peptide drug discovery have been significantly enhanced by technological innovations such as computer-assisted drug discovery, gene-editing techniques, and high-throughput screening. These methods, supported by bioinformatics and multi-omics, have improved the efficiency, cost-effectiveness, and reliability of discovering peptide-based drugs. Peptide drugs offer the advantage of precisely targeting protein–protein interactions, a challenging area in drug discovery. A major breakthrough in this field is the development of proteolysis-targeting chimeras, which enable the targeted degradation of specific proteins with high specificity, surpassing traditional small-molecule inhibitors. This review explores novel methods for peptide drug discovery, highlights therapeutic agents discovered through these techniques, and discusses the potential for delivering peptide-based drugs therapeutically.