a ux journey into the world of early drug discovery

A UX Journey into the…

Nikiforos Karamanis Jennifer Cham

World of Drug Discovery

European Bioinformatics Institute Cambridge, UK

www.targetvalida,on.org  

What’s a “Target”?!

?!

Effec,ve  Drug    -­‐  binds  &  affects  func,on    of  correct  gene  

Drug  that    will  fail  

Drug  that    will  fail  

Drug  that    will  fail  

Drug  that  will  fail  

Project Goal

Support R&D scientists doing…

“Target Validation”

✔  Successful target prioritising è

dramatic impact on drug discovery

Evidence •  Criminal records •  Scripts of interviews •  CCTV footage •  Phone records •  Emails •  Photos

Person (suspect/ potential criminal)

Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Box Theft

(Potential) Target for a new drug

Disease

Scientific evidence

•  Gene data •  Protein data •  Approved drugs •  Gene regulation data •  Biochemical pathways

Map of our UX Journey

Interviews Observations

Scenarios

Team Workspace

UX Workshops Feedback &

Testing

Beta (Mar 2015) Start

(Mar 2014)

Sign-off (Oct 2014)

One-to-One Interviews

What we did

•  Telephone or face-2-face

•  Interviewer & note taker

What worked?

•  Silence •  Tell me about…, Typically…

Challenges

•  Domain knowledge required

•  Understand detail of activities ✔ Empathy map with “ideas”

Tip

Observations

What we did

•  Observe users working on

“Deep dives” in context

What worked?

•  Witnessed complex activities

•  Identified painpoints

Challenges

•  No extensive documentation

•  Generalise from observations

✔ Several days

✔  Review notes ASAP

✔  Combine with interviews Tips

Scenarios

What we did

•  3 scenarios based on interviews,

observations & analytics

What worked?

•  Input, data, actions, output

•  Helped define scope

Challenges

•  Supporting the scenarios ✔  Consolidate

✔  Share & discuss Tips

UX Plan for Stakeholders to Approve

Second leg of our UX Journey

Interviews Observation

Scenario Analysis

Team Workspace

UX Workshops

Feedback & Testing

Beta

Start

Sign-off

✔  ✔  

✔  ✔  ✔  

Team

What we did

•  Multidisciplinary

•  ‘Startup-like’

What worked?

•  Agile approach

•  Weekly UX meeting

Challenges

•  Share ideas

•  Achieve consensus

✔  Emphasis on communication

✔  Acting as facilitators Tips

Workspace

What we did

•  Ideas & designs on the wall

•  Meet & discuss there

What worked?

•  Access to ideas and designs

•  Shared ownership

Challenges

•  Keep sight of actual users

✔  Externalise designs & ideas

✔  Use them in meetings Tips

UX Workshops

(Design Studios)

What we did

•  Rapid & iterative sketching

•  Individual & group work

What worked?

•  Bringing everyone together

•  Brainstorming and sharing ideas

•  Acting as facilitators

Challenges

•  Data dependency

•  Critique and testing

✔  Evolutionary process

✔  Prepare & plan carefully

✔  Opportunity to reflect Tips

Feedback & Testing

What we did

•  Tested early & iteratively

•  Combined with insights from

other activities

What worked?

•  Focus on one feature per sprint

•  Quick email summary

Challenges

•  No extensive documentation

•  Small scale tests

✔ Test early

✔ Include team members

✔ Review ASAP Tips

Feedback on Beta version

I like it. I have found it straightforward to navigate around and assume it will get

better as more links are added in!  

Well done, the layout is intuitive, it was great to see things we had suggested in the workshop on

screen!

Powerful resource, clear links and easy to use without training, especially for a non-

bioinformatician!

Our UX Journey into the World of Drug Discovery

We needed: ✔ time ✔ data ✔ dedicated multidisciplinary team

Take home messages…

Next destinations?

Scale-up

Onboarding, marketing

User support, Training

Data issues, Q&A

Francis  Rowland   Samiul  Hasan  

Nikiforos  Karamanis   Luca  Fumis  

Jennifer  Cham   Michael  Maguire  

Gau,er  Koscielny      

Miguel  Pignatelli  

Andrea  Pierleoni    

Ian  Dunham  

Jessica  Vamathevan  

Team  

Thanks to…

•  Our design and testing participants •  Xavier Watkins, Sangya Pundir and Michele Ide-Smith •  Bren Vaughan (our line manager) •  Ewan Birney & CTTV Leadership team •  Holly Foster for day-to-day help

Questions? niki@ebi.ac.uk jcham@ebi.ac.uk

References

UX •  A Survival Guide for Complex UX [slideshare talk] •  Designing with the user in mind: how user-centred design (UCD) can work for

bioinformatics [slideshare talk]

Drug discovery •  Nat. Chem. Biol. 7, 335-339 (2011) •  Nature Rev. Drug Disc. 3:673 (2004) •  Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, 12, 569 (2013) •  Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 9: 203 (2010)

Images from…

•  Pixabay •  Flickr (Creative commons licensed) •  Created our own