Chemical engineering

By Andrii Lozoniuk Volume 21 Issue 2 – Spring 2020 Gathering compound solubility data is a key step during drug discovery that helps ensure cost-effective screening, yet it is a long process and is often underestimated in terms of difficulty. Global sharing of such data can help pharmaceutical companies minimise unnecessary expenditures in terms of […]

Cryo-EM accelerates drug discovery by delivering previously intractable structural insights By Hans Raaijmakers, et al. Cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), a powerful biophysical technique that can analyse molecular assemblies, is changing the paradigm in structure-based drug design. As targets become more challenging, solving structures of drug target molecules or biologics becomes increasingly difficult. Cryo-EM empowers drug discovery […]

Harnessing the modified proteome for increased diagnostic power By Dr David Bramwell, Dr Steven Laval and Dr Jane McLeod Relevant biomarkers are vitally important in personalised medicine, guiding patient matching to specific therapies for earlier, easier and more effective disease identification and treatment. Here we trace the expectations of ’omicsbased healthcare interventions, from the increased […]

Unlocking the potential of Extracellular Vesicles: from single molecules to novel therapeutics By Dr Anna Caballe and Dr Katarzyna Ginda-Makela As part of normal homeostasis, cells release different types of small-sized membrane vesicles to traffic analytes across membranes, communicate with other cells and remove unwanted cell content. These vesicles can range in size from 30nm […]

Optimising Phenotypic Screening – Single-cell analysis versus 3D multicell analysis By Dr Richard M. Eglen In light of the high failure rate of compounds when they are subjected to clinical testing, we are seeing a renaissance in phenotypic screening in drug discovery. However, most phenotypic screening is based on the use of cellular assays and […]

Evolving Models for NASH Drug Discovery: Tools for stemming a silent epidemic By Dr Sue Grepper, Dr Radina Kostadinova, Dr Eva Thoma and Professor Armin Wolf Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has quietly become one of the most common causes of chronic liver disease in the modern world. If this prevalence is allowed to continue […]

2030 Life Sciences and Health in the Digital Age (Part 1) By Dr Steve Arlington and John Wise One of the key ways in which The Pistoia Alliance works with its members is to help them not just deal with the problems of today, but also to look ahead, to anticipate how the industry is […]

The Reality of Virtual Pharmaceutical Companies By Dr Stephen Naylor and Dr Kirkwood A. Pritchard Jr We discuss the oxymoronic proposition of a Virtual Pharmaceutical Company (VPC) and the typical adopted business model, as well as provide examples of such companies currently trying to undertake this adventurous task. The vagaries and complexities of bringing a […]

Safety First – Automating cell line development By Jon Newman-Smith Developing and maintaining cell cultures in a stable and sterile environment is of paramount importance to protect samples and increase overall success of drug discovery pipelines. Cell lines are extremely fragile and susceptible to contamination which can be catastrophic in terms of both time and […]

Mining Plant Genomes – A modern approach to herbal healing By Michelle Vierra Plants are stationary soldiers. Rooted to one spot, they are not able to chase nutrients or flee from herbivores and pathogens. So in addition to the basic metabolites they synthesise for their survival, they produce a diverse array of organic compounds through […]

From Genotype to Phenotype: Leveraging functional genomics in oncology By Dr Menelas Pangalos & Steve Rees et al. A challenge in drug discovery is that, at best, only around one in five drug candidates will lead to the launch of a medicine. In 2011, AstraZeneca initiated a strategic ‘5R Framework’ focusing on identifying drug projects […]

Fostering Multidisciplinary Collaboration in Drug Discovery By Professor Zeynep Erden, et al. Drug discovery teams combine specialists with in-depth knowledge from a variety of scientific disciplines. Such diversity in thought worlds poses a challenging exercise in cross-disciplinary collaboration and project coordination. Based on a longitudinal field study of five projects in a leading pharmaceutical company, […]

Systems Pharmacology: When multi-targeting is advantageous By Dr Kirkwood A. Pritchard Jr, Dr Dustin P. Martin and Dr Stephen Naylor The safety and efficacy of therapeutic drugs still requires improvement. In part this is due to the promiscuity of individual drugs, which on average can interact with an estimated 6-28 other off-target moieties. However, the […]

The Growth of Organoids in Cancer Drug Discovery By Dr J. Mark Treherne, et al., Will the automated expansion of organoids help improve the productivity of cancer drug discovery? Increasingly, complex cell-based assays and tissues are routinely used as part of cancer drug discovery. However, conventional monolayer or suspension cultures can be poorly predictive of […]

Increasing Drug Discovery Success With 3D Cell Culture Systems By Dr Richard M. Eglen, Dr Feng Li and Dr Tony Frutos Drug candidates often fail in the clinic for two reasons: they lack efficacy or possess an adverse toxicity profile. These failures can come at a high cost, especially when drug candidates have already progressed […]

3D Cell Culture – Engineering Composable, Disease-Tunable 3D Human Microtissues for Drug Discovery By Dr Patrick Guye, Dr Eva Thoma and Dr Olivier Frey In this article, we will share some of what we have learned over the past 10 years as pioneers in the 3D cell culture space and provide guidance for those who […]