HEnsem_DTIs: A heterogeneous ensemble learning model for drug-target interactions prediction

Drug discovery is the process by which a drug is discovered. Drug-target interactions prediction is a major part of drug discovery. Unfortunately, producing new drugs is time-consuming and expensive; Because it requires a lot of human and laboratory resources. Recently, predictions have been made using computational methods to solve these problems and prevent blindly examining all interactions. Various experiences using computational methods show that no single algorithm can be suitable for all applications; Hence, ensemble learning is expressed. Although various ensemble methods have been proposed, it is still not easy to find a suitable ensemble method for a particular dataset. In general, the existing algorithms in aggregation and combination method are selected manually based on experience. Reinforcement learning can be one way to meet this challenge. High-dimensional feature space and class imbalance are among the challenges of drug-target interactions prediction. This paper proposes HEnsem_DTIs, a heterogeneous ensemble model, for predicting drug-target interactions using dimensionality reduction and concepts of recommender systems to address these challenges. HEnsem_DTIs is configured with reinforcement learning. Dimensionality reduction is applied to handle the challenge of high-dimensional feature space and recommender systems to improve under-sampling and solve the class imbalance challenge. Six datasets are used to evaluate the proposed model; Results of the evaluation on datasets show that HEnsem_DTIs works better than other models in this field. Results of evaluation of the proposed model on the first dataset using 10-fold cross-validation experiments show the amount of sensitivity 0.896, specificity 0.954, GM 0.924, AUC 0.930 and AUPR 0.935. •We have proposed a hybrid and efficient approach called HEnsem_DTIs for predicting drug-target interactions.•The HEnsem_DTIs method is a heterogeneous ensemble model, for predicting drug-target interactions.•The HEnsem_DTIs method uses dimensionality reduction and concepts of recommender systems.•Our method can be effective to reduce cost and time producing new drug.•The HEnsem_DTIs method is configured by reinforcement learning.