Regenerative Medicine

Current Trends in RNA Therapeutics Development By Dr Xiaoqiu Wu and Dr Andrew P. Turnbull Cellular RNAs play crucial roles during disease progression and represent a diverse and largely untapped class of biomolecules that can be exploited for drug development. RNA species include messenger RNAs (mRNAs) that are translated into proteins, long non-coding RNAs including […]

Integrated Platform Drug Discovery and Development Companies – Part 1 By Dr Urban A. Kiernan and Dr Stephen Naylor Technology was lauded as the saviour of the drug discovery and development (DDD) process during the late 1990s. A myriad of independent companies developed and offered ‘innovative’ tools, technologies and platforms (TTPs) to pharmaceutical companies in […]

Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPSCs) – Unlocking their full potential for Drug Discovery By Abby Edwards and Dr Richard Massey Human stem cells were once viewed primarily as regenerative materials for tissue repair through cell therapies. However, advances in technologies and protocols mean that induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) are now playing an increasingly important […]

Cell Therapy – Preserving Cell Integrity and Viability To Drive Discovery Mary Kay Bates Cell therapy is poised to play a pivotal role in the development of precision and personalised medicines that will transform healthcare for millions of patients worldwide. Involving the direct use of whole cells or cellular material in patients, cell therapy is […]

3D Cell Culture – A Rapidly Emerging Technique for Drug Discovery By Hannah Gitschier, Dr Ye Fang and Dr Richard M. Eglen The past decades have witnessed significant efforts toward the development of three-dimensional (3D) cell cultures. Today, 3D cell cultures are emerging not only as a new tool in early drug discovery, but also […]

Spheroids Rapidly Becoming a Preferred 3D Cell Culture Format By Dr John Comley There are many advantages associated with culturing cells in three-dimensional (3D) versus conventional two-dimensional (2D) tissue culture. Scaffold-free 3D cell culture systems that generate spheroids (and other similar multicellular aggregations) have proved useful as they offer an easy route to access 3D […]

CRISPR Cas9: Transforming Gene Editing in Drug Discovery Labs By Dr John Comley It is evident from a recent market survey on gene editing in drug discovery that CRISPR/Cas9 is now recognised as the superlative method when attempting a gene knockout or when introducing defined mutations, insertions or modifications to the genome. Although use of […]

Cell Therapy & Gene Therapy – The emerging fourth pillar of healthcare systems By Keith Thompson As the CEO of an organisation that deals exclusively in cell therapy and gene therapy, it is no surprise that I would champion the emergence of these products as the fourth pillar of medicine alongside small molecules, biologics and […]

  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 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 […]