FABind+: Enhancing Molecular Docking through Improved Pocket Prediction and Pose Generation

Kaiyuan Gao, Qizhi Pei, Gongbo Zhang, Jinhua Zhu, Kun He, Lijun Wu

Abstract: Molecular docking is a pivotal process in drug discovery. While traditional techniques rely on extensive sampling and simulation governed by physical principles, deep learning has emerged as a promising alternative, offering improvements in both accuracy and efficiency. Building upon the foundational work of FABind, a model focused on speed and accuracy, we introduce FABind+, an enhanced iteration that significantly elevates the performance of its predecessor. We identify pocket prediction as a critical bottleneck in molecular docking and introduce an enhanced approach. In addition to the pocket prediction module, the docking module has also been upgraded with permutation loss and a more refined model design. These designs enable the regression-based FABind+ to surpass most of the generative models. In contrast, while sampling-based models often struggle with inefficiency, they excel in capturing a wide range of potential docking poses, leading to better overall performance. To bridge the gap between sampling and regression docking models, we incorporate a simple yet effective sampling technique coupled with a lightweight confidence model, transforming the regression-based FABind+ into a sampling version without requiring additional training. This involves the introduction of pocket clustering to capture multiple binding sites and dropout sampling for various conformations. The combination of a classification loss and a ranking loss enables the lightweight confidence model to select the most accurate prediction. Experimental results and analysis demonstrate that FABind+ (both the regression and sampling versions) not only significantly outperforms the original FABind, but also achieves competitive state-of-the-art performance. Our code is available at https://github.com/QizhiPei/FABind.