Developing new drugs is costly, complex and generally takes years to reach a point where novel treatments are ready to be validated by clinical tests--but scientists within the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research turned to high-tech tools to more rapidly funnel out drug compounds that could effectively target COVID-19. "Rightfully, the people of the United States and the world want an answer fast," Deputy Director of the institute's Experimental Therapeutics Branch Maj. Brandon Pybus told Nextgov during a recent virtual panel. "So we looked into ways that we could shave time off of the front end of the drug discovery process, which can be pretty lengthy when it takes its normal course, because you, of course, have to not only prove that the drugs that you're developing are safe, but you have to prove that they're effective--and then they have to clear all of these regulatory paths." The Experimental Therapeutics Branch holds significant clout as a drug discovery and development program, including having a hand in every Food and Drug Administration-approved malaria prevention drug.