Cellular & Molecular biology

Metabolomics – A Playbook for Functional Genomics By Dr David Ferrick If we have learned anything from scientific research in the last 20 years, it is that finding cures to complex diseases is difficult. Despite the promise of the genomic revolution, disease progression and patient outcomes are still not easily predicted by genetic factors alone. […]

By Dr John Comley High-content screening (HCS) is a well-established approach for the multiparametric analysis of cellular events. Since its first introduction more than a decade ago, high content imaging systems have continually evolved with many improvements enabled to meet user demands of greater flexibility and the growing requirements of assays involving complex cellular disease […]

Full Length Isoform Sequencing (Iso-Seq) Yields a More Comprehensive View of Gene Activity By Luke Hickey RNA-seq has revolutionised how scientists can interrogate gene expression. But after years of performing RNA-seq studies with short-read sequencers, many have realised that there is more to be discovered. Comprehensive transcriptome analysis – an essential tool for characterising disease, […]

By Dr James Lim and Dr Fred Aswad While the use of human cell lines has become a permanent fixture in drug discovery and development, the lingering issue has been in their inconsistent results. This article discusses current attempts to make results from cell culture systems more biologically relevant which, in turn, could lead to […]

Microtissues For In Vitro Toxicity Assessment: Cost effective and in vivo relevant toxicology tools By Dr Stephanie Ravenscroft, Dr Caroline Bauch, Dr Laura Hinton and Dr Paul Walker Conventional two-dimensional (2D) cell models (adherent cells grown on cell culture plates or cells in suspension) are limited in their abilities to accurately predict clinical toxicity since […]

Synthetic Lethality and Anti Cancer Drug Discovery By Jonathan D Moore Classically-activated oncogene targets have been a mainstay of cancer drug discovery for the past 15 years, but the druggable targets in this category have been largely mined out. Future efforts to drug the cancer genome must take synthetic lethal approaches exploiting vulnerabilities opened up […]

  by Dr John Comley The case for using more physiologically-relevant cells for modelling disease pathophysiology, for understanding a drug’s mechanism of action, in toxicology/safety testing and in phenotypic drug screening assays is now well accepted. Human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) are seen as a resource from which to differentiate unlimited quantities of almost […]

The Role Of Immunodeficient Animal Models In Advancing Immuno-Oncology Research By Dr Michael Seiler From inbred wild-type to more advanced genetically-engineered strains, mouse models enable researchers to gain important insights into the complex biological underpinnings of human cancer. Among those, spontaneous and genetically engineered immunodeficient strains can be administered in both primary human tumour tissue […]

Digital Pharma – How Digital Is Reshaping The Pharma Arena By Ulrica Sehlstedt, Nils Bohlin, Fredrik de Mare and Richard Beetz The pharmaceutical industry in the 20th and early 21st century has been in constant change, driven by both incremental and breakthrough innovations. These range from the discovery of penicillin and effective, targeted cancer drugs […]

By Dr Jean- Pierre Wery Optimal treatment for any disease is one that can cure or prevent spreading with minimal impact on the patient’s quality of life. In the case of cancer, therapeutic agents were initially designed to kill rapidly dividing cells. These traditional treatments, namely chemotherapy and radiotherapy, remain the backbone of current therapy. […]

Phenotypic Drug Discovery: Striving towards the highest level of biological relevance By Dr John Comley Phenotypic drug discovery (PDD) implies screening where the molecular mechanism of action is not assumed and does not require knowledge of the molecular target. As such phenotypic drug discovery is comparable to empirical screening, which was historically used in drug […]

How Neutron Science Has Enabled Innovation in Drug Design and Delivery By Dr Giovanna Fragneto Meeting global health challenges, from cancer to viral infections, requires a profound understanding of living processes – not just at the level of cells but right down at the molecular level. And designing the most efficient therapeutics requires an in-depth […]

The California Institute for Regenerative Medicines Human iPSC Initiative By Dr Thomas J. Novak This article discusses large-scale generation of patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) to accelerate the understanding of disease biology and drug discovery. In 2012, the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) announced its Human iPSC Initiative, an ambitious effort to generate […]

Share Share Tweet Email Overcoming the Disruption Dip in the Aftermath of Mergers & Acquisitions Overcoming the Disruption Dip in the Aftermath of Mergers & Acquisitions By Roger Humphrey M&A deals are disrupting the life science industry – and that’s good, mostly. Yet, when a company reshapes its facilities footprint in the wake of a […]

The Benefits of Pre-Competitive Collaboration in the Pharmaceutical Industry By Richard Holland Pre-competitive collaboration allows a group of competing companies to come together to develop a solution for a problem that they all share, and from which none of them would gain a competitive advantage. Although the primary goal is often cited as the development […]

New Developments in Single Cell Separation and Analysis Technologies By Dr John Comley Drug Discovery Recent advances of single cell technologies are facilitating the opportunity to discern biological insights within individual cells and providing a means to reveal previously hidden relationships between individual cells within a population. Single cell technologies can be crudely split between […]