Home › The Lead Compound
The Lead Compound
The on-ramp to drug discovery that doesn't exist anywhere else — a full course on how a molecule becomes a medicine, target to market, written so a curious newcomer and a working scientist can read the same page. Start from zero; finish able to read a trial result, a pipeline, or a biotech pitch like someone on the inside. This page is the map; the articles live on Substack.
New here? Read “Start Here” for how the course is built and how to read it — then begin with the free spine.
Pick a path
The spine reads linearly; the other paths thread the curriculum for what you need. Tap a path to filter the map; every article names what it rests on.
Spine 13
The free backbone — the whole path from the decision to fund a program to the patient who receives the drug. Start here.
- SP-00Before the Pipelinefree
- SP-01The Disease Tells You What to Do (If You're Listening)free
- SP-02Finding the Knotfree
- SP-03Is This Knot Real?free
- SP-04Finding Something That Sticksfree
- SP-05Molecular Fine-Tuningfree
- SP-06The Last Place You Can Still Be Wrong Cheaplyfree
- SP-07The Application That Lets You Use the Word 'Patient'free
- SP-08The First Humansfree
- SP-09Searching for the Signalfree
- SP-10The Betfree
- SP-11The Document That Becomes a Medicinefree
- SP-12After the Labfree
Foundations 19
The working vocabulary the rest of the course leans on — cells, trials, the FDA, the economics.
- F-01The Cell, Brieflypaid
- F-02DNA, RNA, and Proteins (Without the High School PowerPoint)paid
- F-03Genes Aren't Blueprints, They're Recipespaid
- F-04Organic Chemistry for People Who Don't Want To Take Organic Chemistrypaid
- F-05PK/PD: The Two Curves That Run Drug Discoverypaid
- F-06The Immune System, Drawn From Memorypaid
- F-07Biostatistics for Clinical Trials (Without P-Hacking)paid
- F-08How a Clinical Trial Is Builtpaid
- F-09How to Read a Clinical Trial Paperpaid
- F-10How to Read a Regulatory Documentpaid
- F-11How the FDA Actually Works (The People, the Divisions, the Meetings)paid
- F-12Drug Development Economics, Honestlypaid
- F-13Numerical Fluency for Biotechpaid
- F-14Who Owns a Molecule?paid
- F-15Receptor Occupancy and Why It's the Most Useful Bad Idea in Pharmacologypaid
- F-16Therapeutic Areas, Brieflypaid
- F-17Manufacturing Vocabulary: cGMP, COGS, Lot Releasepaid
- F-18Reimbursement, Brieflypaid
- F-19Placebo Ethics in Terminal Diseasepaid
Drug Stories 24
Deep, multi-part case studies of drugs you have heard of. Each arc follows one real drug through the pipeline.
Ozempic — GLP-1 / peptide
- CS-OZEMPIC-01The Gila Monster's Gift: Exenatide and the Birth of GLP-1 Therapeuticspaid
- CS-OZEMPIC-02Half-Life Engineering: The Fatty Acid That Made Once-Weekly Possiblepaid
- CS-OZEMPIC-03SUSTAIN-6 and the Cardiovascular Halopaid
- CS-OZEMPIC-04Three Brand Names, One Molecule: Ozempic, Wegovy, Rybelsuspaid
- CS-OZEMPIC-05When Demand Outruns the Plant: GLP-1 Shortages and Compoundingpaid
Keytruda — checkpoint antibody
- CS-KEYTRUDA-01The Brake on the Brake: How PD-1 Was Misunderstood for a Decadepaid
- CS-KEYTRUDA-02The Project Merck Almost Out-Licensedpaid
- CS-KEYTRUDA-03KEYNOTE-001: The Phase 1 That Became Five Phase 1spaid
- CS-KEYTRUDA-04Companion Diagnostics: Why PD-L1 IHC Co-Evolved With the Drugpaid
- CS-KEYTRUDA-05Tissue-Agnostic Approval: MSI-High and the Future of Labelspaid
- CS-KEYTRUDA-06The $31.7B Drug: What Keytruda's Lifecycle Tells Us About Pharma Economicspaid
Enhertu — antibody-drug conjugate
- CS-ENHERTU-01Picking the Antibody, the Linker, and the Payload (Three Programs in One)paid
- CS-ENHERTU-02The Bystander Effect: Why Enhertu Worked in HER2-Lowpaid
- CS-ENHERTU-03DESTINY-Breast04: How an ADC Created a New Disease Categorypaid
- CS-ENHERTU-04The Pneumonitis Question: An ADC's Defining Toxicitypaid
- CS-ENHERTU-05Pricing the ADC: Per-Cycle Economics and the HER2-Low TAM Expansionpaid
Carvykti — CAR-T cell therapy
- CS-CARVYKTI-01BCMA: The Right Target Found Twicepaid
- CS-CARVYKTI-02Two Binding Domains: Why Cilta-cel's CAR Design Matterspaid
- CS-CARVYKTI-03The CARTITUDE Trials: When Phase 1b/2 Is the Approval Trialpaid
- CS-CARVYKTI-04Approval Conditions for a Drug That's Different in Every Patientpaid
- CS-CARVYKTI-05Vein-to-Vein at Scale: Why CAR-T Capacity Is the Bottleneckpaid
Modality Library 27
How each kind of drug actually works. Reference-grade; releases alongside the drug stories that use it.
- M-ADC-02The Target Is an Address, Not a Brakepaid
- M-ADC-04Three Hits in Onepaid
- M-ADC-05Why ADC Linkers Are the Whole Gamepaid
- M-ADC-06The Bullet That Goes Off Earlypaid
- M-ADC-08Halfway Between an Antibody and a Poisonpaid
- M-ADC-12Three Factories in One Vialpaid
- M-AUTO-01A Cancer You Can Teach the Patient's Own Cells to Findpaid
- M-AUTO-02The Target Has to Be on the Surface — and on Cells You Can Losepaid
- M-AUTO-03Where Else Does the Antigen Live?paid
- M-AUTO-05There Is No Molecule — You Build the Receptor From Partspaid
- M-AUTO-06You Can't Rehearse This in a Mousepaid
- M-AUTO-07An IND for a Drug That's a Process, Not a Moleculepaid
- M-AUTO-08The Dose That Escalates Itselfpaid
- M-AUTO-09When a Single-Arm Phase 2 Is the Approval Trialpaid
- M-AUTO-10The Randomized Trial That Moves the Drug Earlierpaid
- M-AUTO-11Approving a Drug That's Different in Every Patientpaid
- M-AUTO-12Why CAR-T Manufacturing Is the Only Stage That Sees the Patientpaid
- M-MAB-02An Antibody Can Only Hit What It Can Reachpaid
- M-MAB-04You Don't Invent the Antibody — You Find the One the Body Already Madepaid
- M-MAB-05Same Target, Different Antibody: Choosing the Format and the Epitopepaid
- M-MAB-06A New Kind of Safe, and a New Kind of Dangerpaid
- M-MAB-08Why an Antibody Can Be Dosed Flatpaid
- M-MAB-12A Living Drug Has No Genericpaid
- M-PEP-04The Hit You Don't Have to Findpaid
- M-PEP-05Peptide Half-Life Engineering: How Ozempic Got to Once-Weeklypaid
- M-PEP-06A Different Kind of Safepaid
- M-PEP-12The Pen, Not the Peptidepaid
Crosscutting 5
The angles — target ID for engineers, reading a patent, the honest glossary.
- X-01What Target ID Looks Like to a Software Engineer vs. a Biologistpaid
- X-06Reading a Pharma Earnings Call as a Scientistpaid
- X-07The Diligence Memo: What a Biotech Investor Actually Readspaid
- X-08Cost of Capital, Phase Probabilities, and Why Biotech NPVs Look Like Thatpaid
- X-14The Honest Glossary: 50 Terms Biotech Uses Wrongpaid
This map shows what has published so far and grows as new articles go live on Substack. New case studies and modality deep-dives keep arriving — there isn't a last page.