Preclinical

THE COVID-19 RACE how mouse models will help researchers cross the finish line By Dr Megan MacBride The emergence of SARS-CoV-2 virus and the disease it causes, COVID-19, have fuelled significant shifts in preclinical research across the globe. Amid the worldwide health emergency created by high infection rates, rapid transmission spread and relatively high mortality […]

By Dr Ross Macdonald Cell-based therapies are being widely recognised for their potential to treat a variety of medical conditions, but they face major obstacles toward commercialisation. Traditionally, they have been difficult and expensive to make in large quantities. Biopharmaceutical companies must develop manufacturing solutions that will enable them to efficiently and reproducibly create the […]

Honing in on perfect targeting By Dr Samantha Zaroff Volume 21 Issue 3 – Summer 2020 The pros and cons of different delivery modalities for personalised cancer vaccines. Introducing neoantigens directly into a patient in order to elicit an anti-tumour killing immune response is known as personalised cancer vaccine therapy. Currently, there is a huge […]

The CELL CULTURE innovations increasing drug discovery success By Helen Stewart-Miller and Abby George Volume 21 Issue 3 – Summer 2020 ‘Fail early, fail fast’ has been a mantra in the pharmaceutical industry for several years and directly impacts the overall strategy of many drug discovery and development programmes. Yet, despite the drive to fail […]

State-of-the art facility is home to the company’s next-generation, fully automated platform for drug discovery. Arctoris Ltd, the developer of the world’s first fully automated drug discovery platform, today opened the doors to its new global headquarters and state-of-the-art research and development (R&D) facility in Oxford, UK. Housing the company’s proprietary technology and providing space […]

The vaccine is currently being evaluated in Phase 3 clinical testing. The investigational vaccine known as mRNA-1273 protected mice from infection with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, according to research published today in Nature. Scientists at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, and the biotechnology […]

This a new clinical development partnership to progress a therapeutic DNA vaccine, TGL-100, into an early phase clinical trial targeting head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) HNSCC is the UK’s eighth most common cancer, but treatment options are limited and around 4,000 of those affected in the UK die each year. Whilst existing immunotherapies […]

This will explore clinical trials with IMM-101, in combination with other treatments, in difficult to treat cancers, with a particular focus on epithelial cancers such as pancreatic cancer and sarcoma. Immodulon, an immuno-oncology company, and the Champalimaud Foundation, a private, non-profit, research organisation in Lisbon, Portugal, have announced research intended to examine the potential use […]

Researchers at the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center and UCLA School of Dentistry have identified a potential new combination therapy to treat advanced head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, the most common type of head and neck cancer. A study in mice found that using an anti-PD1 immunotherapy drug in combination with PTC209, an inhibitor […]

British Patient Capital is committing $65m to SV Health Investors’ latest fund, SV7 Impact Medicine Fund (IMF), to turn scientific breakthroughs into biotech companies producing high impact precision medicine drugs for poorly treated diseases. The commitment increases British Patient Capital’s exposure to life sciences and health technology, building on a commitment to the Dementia Discovery […]

14 July 2020 SCIEX has celebrated its 50th anniversary with a digital product launch. SCIEX virtual product experience introduced products that enable customers to Run Fast, Go Beyond and Power Up. “Half a century ago, SCIEX set out with a mission to develop analytical technologies for aerospace. Today, our technologies cover analysis of environmental hazards, […]

The Translational Research Institute-based Mater researchers in partnership with The University of Queensland have developed a new cancer vaccine, which has shown promising signs in preclinical laboratory studies. Funded by grants from the Worldwide Cancer Research in the United Kingdom, and Mater Foundation, the new vaccine could be potentially used to treat a variety of blood […]

9 July 2020 Image: Science in HD So far there are no approved drugs for Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease In an effort to combat a growing worldwide epidemic of Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD), scientists have discovered a new target and a new therapy that has shown promising results in preclinical mouse models, according to […]

23 June 2020 Image: Austin Distel The Innovation Credit is awarded by the Dutch government through its agency RVO of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy and is aimed at the development of promising and challenging innovations. The €3.1million fund will support the preclinical development of novel QPCTL (Glutaminyl-peptide cyclotransferase-like) inhibitors, completing the […]

18 May, 2020 The research-driven pharmaceutical company said the new acquisition provides assets targeting the tumour stroma and myeloid cells. Boehringer Ingelheim also announced it is collaborating with CDR-Life to develop antibody fragment-based therapeutics for geographic atrophy, a leading cause of blindness. The first programme, now in late preclinical development, is an antibody inhibitor of […]

Meeting analytical challenges in a brave new world of next generation biotherapeutics By Mani Krishnan and Susan Darling Volume 21 Issue 2 – Spring 2020 The need for innovative advanced analytical tools to accelerate the development of immunotherapies and other complex biologics that may one day cure genetic diseases and cancer has never been greater. […]