IMI launches seven new projects to boost drug development
The Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) announces the kick-off of its 4th wave of projects, which have been set up to tackle some of the biggest challenges in drug development. The new projects should ultimately accelerate the development of safer and more effective drugs for patients. With a total budget of €55.6 million, STEMBANCC is one of IMI's biggest projects to date. It aims to generate and characterise 1 500 human induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cell lines that researchers could use to study diseases and test drugs for safety and efficacy. iPS cells were the subject of this year's Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
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Leuven research opens new pathway for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease
Scientists from VIB and KU Leuven have discovered a new target molecule for the development of a treatment against Alzheimer's disease. There is currently no cure for this disease. Many candidate drugs fail because they also target proteins essential to life. This discovery from Leuven could form a target for a treatment against Alzheimer's disease with fewer side effects and that suppresses the very first symptoms of the disease. This research will be published in the leading journal Nature Medicine.
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Common heart failure drugs could benefit more patients
A novel study from Karolinska Institutet in Sweden suggests that commonly used drugs to treat heart failure and high blood pressure may have a wider range of application than earlier known, and also can be used against so called HFPEF - a type of heart failure that until now has been impossible to treat. The study, which is published in the scientific journal JAMA, shows that the mortality rate in a group of HFPEF patients who used these medications decreased. Heart failure affects 3 per cent of the overall population, and exists in two forms: reduced ability to contract the heart and reduced ability to relax the heart.
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180 researchers from all over the world met in Florence for the "Florence trial"
Palazzo Vecchio, town hall of the city of Florence, welcomed over 180 oncologists and
hematologists for the presentation of the Florence Trial, an international clinical trial conducted by the Menarini Group aimed at assessing the benefits of the drug Febuxostat in the prevention of tumor lysis syndrome. FLORENCE stands for Febuxostat for tumor Lysis syndrOme pREvention iN haematologiC malignanciEs which pays tribute to the city where Menarini's headquarters are located. The trial was presented at Palazzo Vecchio in March during a press conference in the presence of Stefania Saccardi, City Councillor for Welfare.
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Gateway enzyme for chemicals from catnip to cancer drug
Scientists have discovered an enzyme used in nature to make powerful chemicals from catnip to a cancer drug, vinblastine. The discovery opens up the prospect of producing these chemicals cheaply and efficiently. They are produced naturally by some plants such as the medicinal Madagascar periwinkle, but faster-growing plants could be used to produce them. With synthetic biology, improvements could also be made to them.
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Rare parasitic fungi could have anti-flammatory benefits
Caterpillar fungi (Cordyceps) are rare parasites found on hibernating caterpillars in the mountains of Tibet. For centuries they have been highly prized as a traditional Chinese medicine - just a small amount can fetch hundreds of pounds. Scientists at The University of Nottingham have been studying how this fungus could work by studying cordycepin, one of the drugs found in these mushrooms. They have already discovered that cordycepin has potential as a cancer drug. Their new work indicates that it could also have anti-inflammatory characteristics with the potential to help sufferers of asthma, rheumatoid arthritis, renal failure and stroke damage.
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Doubling down against diabetes
A collaboration between scientists in Munich, Germany and Bloomington, USA may have overcome one of the major challenges drug makers have struggled with for years: Delivering powerful nuclear hormones to specific tissues, while keeping them away from others. The teams led by physician Matthias Tschöp (Helmholtz Zentrum München, and Technische Universität München) and chemist Richard DiMarchi (Indiana University) used natural gut peptides targeting cell membrane receptors and engineered them to carry small steroids known to act at the cell nucleus. DiMarchi and Tschöp hoped that such "turbo-charged" hormone hybrids would only deliver their steroid inside cells, where their specific peptide receptor was expressed at the surface.
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