Listen to this article on the DDW Podcast: Combination immunotherapies are one of the most exciting advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMP) being developed, with incredible potential for treating cancer, says Panagiotis Parsonidis, a molecular biologist and lead researcher at RGCC. DDW speaks to him about VAXO-Q-RE developments, a combination immunotherapy that will soon… Read More
HOOKIPA Pharma is advancing HB-201 to Phase II to be evaluated in combination with pembrolizumab as first or second-line treatment for Human Papillomavirus Positive 16 (HPV16+) squamous cell head and neck cancers (HNSCC). Interim Phase I data in heavily pre-treated patients continue to show HB-200 monotherapy (both… Read More
Listen to this article on the DDW Podcast: RareCan is a new company based in the UK. Its aim is to accelerate research into rare cancers. However, finding suitable patients willing to take part in research and trials of new drugs is difficult, which impacts the discovery process. Professor Andy Hall, Founding Director and… Read More
SpyBiotech, a biotechnology company with a vaccine platform technology targeting infectious diseases, cancer and chronic diseases, has appointed Simon Jones as VP of Finance and Operations, and expanded its scientific team with four new hires. Jones takes up the permanent position from Vien Phan, who held the… Read More
After decades of research, the UK implemented a human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine programme for teenage girls in 2008. Now, for the first time, a study has shown that the UK HPV vaccine programme works and will save lives, according to research funded by Cancer Research UK. The vaccine was shown to… Read More
Scientists in Singapore have assembled a large, high-resolution atlas of gastric cancer, a leading cause of global cancer death. The atlas provides, at the level of single cells, new insights into how gastric cancers progress and how tumours from separate patients differ from one another. The findings also identified molecular pathways… Read More
AstraZeneca’s Tagrisso (osimertinib) has been accepted for restricted use within NHS Scotland by the Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) for the treatment of early-stage lung cancer. Osimertinib will be used as monotherapy for the adjuvant treatment after complete tumour resection in adult patients with stage IB-IIIA non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose tumours have… Read More
SAGA Diagnostics, a cancer liquid biopsy and genomic testing company focused on precision oncology and non-invasive ultrasensitive monitoring of cancer patients, has entered into an assay development agreement with Astra Zeneca to develop SAGAsafe dPCR assays towards undisclosed methylated targets for analyses of tissue samples and liquid biopsies. James Hadfield,… Read More
Researchers at the Francis Crick Institute, The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust and UCL have found immune cell patterns within tumours that can help predict if patients with kidney cancer will respond to immunotherapy. Clear cell renal cell carcinoma is the most common type of kidney cancer, accounting for… Read More
Doina Ionescu, General Manager for the UK & Ireland at Merck, talks with DDW’s Megan Thomas about Merck’s innovations in the oncology sector, her thoughts on the future opportunities in the sector, as well some trade secrets and more. MT: The company has expertise in the oncology space – what innovations can… Read More
NHS England and public sector bodies must restart clinical trials as part of the process to improve cancer services the pharmaceutical industry has warned. David Watson, Executive Director for Patient Access at the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry, gave evidence to the Health and Social Care Committee for its inquiry… Read More
RareCan has received approval from the NHS Research Ethics Committee to establish its BioResource at Newcastle University, which will store tissue samples from rare cancer patients collected during surgery, will be accessible to scientists around the globe undertaking research into the prevention, diagnosis or treatment of rare cancers. This reduces… Read More
Leucid Biohas raised £11.5 million in a Series A financing round, which will be used to initiate a Phase I trial of its lead candidate, LEU-011, for the treatment of platinum resistant ovarian cancer. CAR T-cell therapy is a technology in which the patient’s own immune cells are reprogrammed… Read More
University of Queensland researchers have identified a pathway helping the breast cancer protein BRCA1 repair damaged DNA in a study that will inform future targeted therapies. Professor Robert Parton, Professor Alpha Yap and Dr Kerrie-Ann McMahon from the university’s Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB) identified an association between two… Read More
This paid-for advertorial by Manchester BioGel appeared in the DDW / ELRIG UK Drug Discovery 2021 supplement in DDW Volume 22, Issue 4 – Fall 2021 Communication of cells with their microenvironment is vital in understanding intracellular processes. Most matrices lack the mechanical and biochemical tuneability necessary to recreate the cancer microenvironment. Read More
Advances in treatments for human diseases, including cancer, rely on the ability to gain detailed information into the function, modulation, and variation of the immune system in response to stimuli or immunological challenge. Insights derived from these data have, for example, revolutionised cancer treatment by enabling the development of… Read More
