The emergence of Staphylococcus aureus strains resistant to almost all approved antibiotics in the clinic poses an urgent public health concern. Thus, new antibiotics exploiting alternative antibacterial mechanisms or molecular structures are critically needed to address the long-term threat of multidrug-resistant S. aureus, particularly methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA).
Astrazeneca plc, which seemed to have backed away from vaccine development after the COVID-19 pandemic, clearly took a shine to Icosavax Inc.’s virus-like particle technology and signed a deal to take over the firm for as much as $1.1 billion.
Astrivax NV has been awarded a €3 million grant by Flanders Innovation & Entrepreneurship (VLAIO) to advance development of the company’s therapeutic vaccine targeting chronic hepatitis B.
The Nobel Prize-winning modification that prevents the innate immune system from recognizing injected mRNA as foreign and blocking transcription of the protein it encodes has been found on some occasions to cause ribosomal frameshifting.
Redhill Biopharma Ltd.’s stock (NASDAQ:RDHL) has soared in recent days following news that the U.S. FDA granted five years of market exclusivity for Talicia, a first-line therapy for eradication of Helicobacter pylori infection, which affects about 35% of the U.S. adult population.
Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC has patented compounds reported to be useful for the treatment of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and metapneumovirus (MPV) infections.
Ebviously GmbH, a spin-off from Helmholtz Munich (HMGU), has presented new in vitro data for its Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) vaccine candidate EBV-001. Based on noninfectious virus-like particles (VLPs) derived from EBV, EBV-001 is designed as a highly immunogenic, multiantigen vaccine to prevent EBV-associated diseases, such as infectious mononucleosis.
Tuberculosis still kills a lot of people worldwide (1.6 million deaths per year). Previous findings demonstrated that induced myeloid leukemia cell differentiation protein Mcl-1 inhibitors reduced the growth of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in human macrophages, but when inhibiting multiple proteins from the Mcl-1/Bcl-2 family, the result was more effective and in a more complex human in vitro granuloma environment.
Current antiviral agents for COVID-19 treatment target viral proteins, which are susceptible to mutation during SARS-CoV-2 evolution. A potential strategy to fight emerging drug resistances is the development of compounds targeting host proteins that are indispensable for the viral life cycle.
LW-231, under development by Shanghai Longwood Biopharmaceuticals Co. Ltd., is a novel bifunctional molecule designed to simultaneously modulate hepatitis B virus (HBV) capsid assembly and activate cGAS-STING pathway. Preclinical data were recently presented.