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The Accelerating COVID-19 Therapeutic Interventions and Vaccines (ACTIV) Partnership on May 18, 2020

Posted in Coronavirus Gene Expression, COVID-19, Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, drug repurposing, Personal Health Applications: Tech Innovations serves HealhCare, Personalized and Precision Medicine & Genomic Research, Pharmaceutical Discovery, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery, Pharmaceutical Industry Competitive Intelligence, Pharmaceutical R&D Informatics, Pharmaceutical R&D Investment, Pharmacogenomics, Pharmacovigilance, Population Health Management, Population Health Management, Genetics & Pharmaceutical, SARS-CoV-2, Serology tests for coronavirus antibodies, Vaccinology, Virus Infective Acute Respiratory Syndrome: SARS-CoV on May 18, 2020| Leave a Comment »


The Accelerating COVID-19 Therapeutic Interventions and Vaccines (ACTIV) Partnership on May 18, 2020: Leadership of AbbVie, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Bristol Myers Squibb, Eisai, Eli Lilly, Evotec, Gilead, GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson, KSQ Therapeutics, Merck, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, Sanofi, Takeda, and Vir. We also thank multiple NIH institutes (especially NIAID), the FDA, BARDA, CDC, the European Medicines Agency, the Department of Defense, the VA, and the Foundation for NIH

Reporter: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

May 18, 2020

Accelerating COVID-19 Therapeutic Interventions and Vaccines (ACTIV) An Unprecedented Partnership for Unprecedented Times

Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD1; Paul Stoffels, MD2
Article Information
JAMA. Published online May 18, 2020. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.8920
Author Affiliations

  • 1Office of the Director, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland
  • 2Johnson & Johnson, New Brunswick, New Jersey

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It has been more than a century since the world has encountered a pandemic like coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), and the rate of spread of COVID-19 around the globe and the associated morbidity and mortality have been staggering.1 To address what may be the greatest public health crisis of this generation, it is imperative that all sectors of society work together in unprecedented ways, with unprecedented speed. In this Viewpoint, we describe such a partnership.

First reported in Wuhan, China, in December 2019, COVID-19 is caused by a highly transmissible novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2). By March 2020, as COVID-19 moved rapidly throughout Europe and the US, most researchers and regulators from around the world agreed that it would be necessary to go beyond “business as usual” to contain this formidable infectious agent. The biomedical research enterprise was more than willing to respond to the challenge of COVID-19, but it soon became apparent that much-needed coordination among important constituencies was lacking.

Clinical trials of investigational vaccines began as early as January, but with the earliest possible distribution predicted to be 12 to 18 months away. Clinical trials of experimental therapies had also been initiated, but most, except for a trial testing the antiviral drug remdesivir,2 were small and not randomized. In the US, there was no true overarching national process in either the public or private sector to prioritize candidate therapeutic agents or vaccines, and no efforts were underway to develop a clear inventory of clinical trial capacity that could be brought to bear on this public health emergency. Many key factors had to change if COVID-19 was to be addressed effectively in a relatively short time frame.

On April 3, leaders of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), with coordination by the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (FNIH), met with multiple leaders of research and development from biopharmaceutical firms, along with leaders of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), the European Medicines Agency (EMA), and academic experts. Participants sought urgently to identify research gaps and to discuss opportunities to collaborate in an accelerated fashion to address the complex challenges of COVID-19.

These critical discussions culminated in a decision to form a public-private partnership to focus on speeding the development and deployment of therapeutics and vaccines for COVID-19. The group assembled 4 working groups to focus on preclinical therapeutics, clinical therapeutics, clinical trial capacity, and vaccines (Figure). In addition to the founding members, the working groups’ membership consisted of senior scientists from each company or agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and the Department of Defense.

Figure.

Accelerating COVID-19 Therapeutic Interventions and Vaccines

ACTIV’s 4 working groups, each with one cochair from NIH and one from industry, have made rapid progress in establishing goals, setting timetables, and forming subgroups focused on specific issues (Figure). The goals of the working group, along with a few examples of their accomplishments to date, include the following.

 

The Preclinical Working Group was charged to standardize and share preclinical evaluation resources and methods and accelerate testing of candidate therapies and vaccines to support entry into clinical trials. The aim is to increase access to validated animal models and to enhance comparison of approaches to identify informative assays. For example, through the ACTIV partnership, this group aims to extend preclinical researchers’ access to high-throughput screening systems, especially those located in the Biosafety Level 3 (BSL3) facilities currently required for many SARS-CoV-2 studies. This group also is defining a prioritization approach for animal use, assay selection and staging of testing, as well as completing an inventory of animal models, assays, and BSL 3/4 facilities.

 

The Therapeutics Clinical Working Group has been charged to prioritize and accelerate clinical evaluation of a long list of therapeutic candidates for COVID-19 with near-term potential. The goals have been to prioritize and test potential therapeutic agents for COVID-19 that have already been in human clinical trials. These may include agents with either direct-acting or host-directed antiviral activity, including immunomodulators, severe symptom modulators, neutralizing antibodies, or vaccines. To help achieve these goals, the group has established a steering committee with relevant expertise and objectivity to set criteria for evaluating and ranking potential candidate therapies submitted by industry partners. Following a rigorous scientific review, the prioritization subgroup has developed a complete inventory of approximately 170 already identified therapeutic candidates that have acceptable safety profiles and different mechanisms of action. On May 6, the group presented its first list of repurposed agents recommended for inclusion in ACTIV’s master protocol for adaptive clinical trials. Of the 39 agents that underwent final prioritization review, the group identified 6 agents—including immunomodulators and supportive therapies—that it proposes to move forward into the master protocol clinical trial(s) expected to begin later in May.

 

The Clinical Trial Capacity Working Group is charged with assembling and coordinating existing networks of clinical trials to increase efficiency and build capacity. This will include developing an inventory of clinical trial networks supported by NIH and other funders in the public and private sectors, including contract research organizations. For each network, the working group seeks to identify their specialization in different populations and disease stages to leverage infrastructure and expertise from across multiple networks, and establish a coordination mechanism across networks to expedite trials, track incidence across sites, and project future capacity. The clinical trials inventory subgroup has already identified 44 networks, with access to adult populations and within domestic reach, for potential inclusion in COVID-19 trials. Meanwhile, the survey subgroup has developed 2 survey instruments to assess the capabilities and capacities of those networks, and its innovation subgroup has developed a matrix to guide deployment of innovative solutions throughout the trial life cycle.

 

The Vaccines Working Group has been charged to accelerate evaluation of vaccine candidates to enable rapid authorization or approval.4 This includes development of a harmonized master protocol for adaptive trials of multiple vaccines, as well as development of a trial network that could enroll as many as 100 000 volunteers in areas where COVID-19 is actively circulating. The group also aims to identify biomarkers to speed authorization or approval and to provide evidence to address cross-cutting safety concerns, such as immune enhancement. Multiple vaccine candidates will be evaluated, and the most promising will move to a phase 2/3 adaptive trial platform utilizing large geographic networks in the US and globally.5 Because time is of the essence, ACTIV will aim to have the next vaccine candidates ready to enter clinical trials by July 1, 2020.

References

1.

Desai  A .  Twentieth-century lessons for a modern coronavirus pandemic.   JAMA. Published online April 27, 2020. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.4165
ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar

2.

NIH clinical trial shows remdesivir accelerates recovery from advanced COVID-19. National Institutes of Health. Published April 29, 2020. Accessed May 7, 2020. https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/nih-clinical-trial-shows-remdesivir-accelerates-recovery-advanced-covid-19

3.

NIH to launch public-private partnership to speed COVID-19 vaccine and treatment options. National Institutes of Health. Published April 17, 2020. Accessed May 7, 2020. https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/nih-launch-public-private-partnership-speed-covid-19-vaccine-treatment-options

4.

Corey  L , Mascola  JR , Fauci  AS , Collins  FS .  A strategic approach to COVID-19 vaccine R&D.   Science. Published online May 11, 2020. doi:10.1126/science.abc5312PubMedGoogle Scholar

5.

Angus  DC .  Optimizing the trade-off between learning and doing in a pandemic.   JAMA. Published online March 30, 2020. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.4984
ArticlePubMedGoogle Scholar

6.

Accelerating COVID-19 Therapeutic Interventions and Vaccines (ACTIV) portal. National Institutes of Health. Accessed May 15, 2020. https://www.nih.gov/ACTIV

7.

Accelerating Medicines Partnership (AMP). National Institutes of Health. Published February 4, 2014. Accessed May 7, 2020. https://www.nih.gov/research-training/accelerating-medicines-partnership-amp
SOURCE

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Live Notes, Real Time Conference Coverage 2020 AACR Virtual Meeting April 27, 2020 Opening Remarks and Clinical Session 11:45am-1:15pm Advances in Cancer Drug Discovery

Posted in Cancer - General, Cancer and Current Therapeutics, CANCER BIOLOGY & Innovations in Cancer Therapy, Conference Coverage with Social Media, Curation, Drug Delivery Platform Technology, Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery, Pharmaceutical Industry Competitive Intelligence, Pharmaceutical R&D Investment, Pharmacodynamics and Pharmacokinetics, REAL TIME Conference Coverage Twitter's Hashtags and Handles per Presentation/session, Scientific & Biotech Conferences: Press Coverage, Small Molecules in Development of Therapeutic Drugs, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on April 27, 2020| Leave a Comment »


Live Notes, Real Time Conference Coverage 2020 AACR Virtual Meeting April 27, 2020 Opening Remarks and Clinical Session 11:45am-1:15pm Advances in Cancer Drug Discovery

SESSION VMS.CH01.01 – Advances in Cancer Drug Design and Discovery

April 27, 2020, 11:45 AM – 1:15 PM
Virtual Meeting: All Session Times Are U.S. EDT
DESCRIPTIONAll session times are U.S. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT).

Session Type
Virtual Minisymposium
Track(s)
Cancer Chemistry
14 Presentations
11:45 AM – 11:45 AM
– ChairpersonZoran Rankovic. St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, TN

11:45 AM – 11:45 AM
– ChairpersonChristopher G. Nasveschuk. C4 Therapeutics, Watertown, MA

11:45 AM – 11:50 AM
– IntroductionZoran Rankovic. St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, TN

11:50 AM – 12:00 PM
1036 – Discovery of a highly potent, efficacious and orally active small-molecule inhibitor of embryonic ectoderm development (EED)Changwei Wang, Rohan Kalyan Rej, Jianfeng Lu, Mi Wang, Kaitlin P. Harvey, Chao-Yie Yang, Ester Fernandez-Salas, Jeanne Stuckey, Elyse Petrunak, Caroline Foster, Yunlong Zhou, Rubin Zhou, Guozhi Tang, Jianyong Chen, Shaomeng Wang. Rogel Cancer Center and Departments of Internal Medicine, Pharmacology, and Medicinal Chemistry, Life Sciences Institute, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, Ascentage Pharma Group, Taizhou, Jiangsu, China

12:00 PM – 12:05 PM
– Discussion

12:05 PM – 12:15 PM
1037 – Orally available small molecule CD73 inhibitor reverses immunosuppression through blocking of adenosine productionXiaohui Du, Brian Blank, Brenda Chan, Xi Chen, Yuping Chen, Frank Duong, Lori Friedman, Tom Huang, Melissa R. Junttila, Wayne Kong, Todd Metzger, Jared Moore, Daqing Sun, Jessica Sun, Dena Sutimantanapi, Natalie Yuen, Tatiana Zavorotinskaya. ORIC Pharmaceuticals, South San Francisco, CA, ORIC Pharmaceuticals, South San Francisco, CA, ORIC Pharmaceuticals, South San Francisco, CA, ORIC Pharmaceuticals, South San Francisco, CA

12:15 PM – 12:20 PM
– Discussion

12:20 PM – 12:30 PM
1038 – A potent and selective PARP14 inhibitor decreases pro-tumor macrophage function and elicits inflammatory responses in tumor explantsLaurie Schenkel, Jennifer Molina, Kerren Swinger, Ryan Abo, Danielle Blackwell, Anne Cheung, William Church, Kristy Kuplast-Barr, Alvin Lu, Elena Minissale, Mario Niepel, Melissa Vasbinder, Tim Wigle, Victoria Richon, Heike Keilhack, Kevin Kuntz. Ribon Therapeutics, Cambridge, MA

12:30 PM – 12:35 PM
– Discussion

12:35 PM – 12:45 PM
1039 – Fragment-based drug discovery to identify small molecule allosteric inhibitors of SHP2. Philip J. Day, Valerio Berdini, Juan Castro, Gianni Chessari, Thomas G. Davies, James E. H. Day, Satoshi Fukaya, Chris Hamlett, Keisha Hearn, Steve Hiscock, Rhian Holvey, Satoru Ito, Yasuo Kodama, Kenichi Matsuo, Yoko Nakatsuru, Nick Palmer, Amanda Price, Tadashi Shimamura, Jeffrey D. St. Denis, Nicola G. Wallis, Glyn Williams, Christopher N. Johnson. Astex Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Cambridge, United Kingdom, Taiho Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd, Tsukuba, Japan

Abstract: The ubiquitously expressed protein tyrosine phosphatase SHP2 is required for signalling downstream of receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs) and plays a role in regulating many cellular processes. Recent advances have shown that genetic knockdown and pharmacological inhibition of SHP2 suppresses RAS/MAPK signalling and inhibits proliferation of RTK-driven cancer cell lines. SHP2 is now understood to act upstream of RAS and plays a role in KRAS-driven cancers, an area of research which is rapidly growing. Considering that RTK deregulation often leads to a wide range of cancers and the newly appreciated role of SHP2 in KRAS-driven cancers, SHP2 inhibitors are therefore a promising therapeutic approach.
SHP2 contains two N-terminal tandem SH2 domains (N-SH2, C-SH2), a catalytic phosphatase domain and a C-terminal tail. SHP2 switches between “open” active and “closed” inactive forms due to autoinhibitory interactions between the N-SH2 domain and the phosphatase domain. Historically, phosphatases were deemed undruggable as there had been no advancements with active site inhibitors. We hypothesised that fragment screening would be highly applicable and amenable to this target to enable alternative means of inhibition through identification of allosteric binding sites. Here we describe the first reported fragment screen against SHP2.
Using our fragment-based PyramidTM approach, screening was carried out on two constructs of SHP2; a closed autoinhibited C-terminal truncated form (phosphatase and both SH2 domains), as well as the phosphatase-only domain. A combination of screening methods such as X-ray crystallography and NMR were employed to identify fragment hits at multiple sites on SHP2, including the tunnel-like allosteric site reported by Chen et al, 2016. Initial fragment hits had affinities for SHP2 in the range of 1mM as measured by ITC. Binding of these hits was improved using structure-guided design to generate compounds which inhibit SHP2 phosphatase activity and are promising starting points for further optimization.

  • anti estrogen receptor therapy: ER degraders is one class
  • AZ9833 enhances degradation of ER alpha
  • worked in preclinical mouse model (however very specific)
  • PK parameters were good for orally available in rodents;  also in vitro and in vivo correlation correlated in rats but not in dogs so they were not sure if good to go in humans
  • they were below Km in rats but already at saturated in dogs, dogs were high clearance
  • predicted human bioavailability at 40%

 

12:45 PM – 12:50 PM
– Discussion

12:50 PM – 1:00 PM
1042 – Preclinical pharmacokinetic and metabolic characterization of the next generation oral SERD AZD9833Eric T. Gangl, Roshini Markandu, Pradeep Sharma, Andy Sykes, Petar Pop-Damkov, Pablo Morentin Gutierrez, James S. Scott, Dermot F. McGinnity, Adrian J. Fretland, Teresa Klinowska. AstraZeneca, Waltham, MA

1:00 PM – 1:05 PM
– Discussion

1:05 PM – 1:15 PM
– Closing RemarksChristopher G. Nasveschuk. MA

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Advancing Drug Development – 12/12/2019, 8:30AM – 8:30PM at The University of Massachusetts Club, One Beacon Street, Boston, MA

Posted in Drug Delivery Platform Technology, Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, Pharmaceutical Discovery, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery, Pharmaceutical R&D Informatics, Pharmaceutical R&D Investment, Pharmacogenomics, Rapid automation of plasma protein pools on November 4, 2019| Leave a Comment »


Advancing Drug Development – 12/12/2019, 8:30AM – 8:30PM at The University of Massachusetts Club, One Beacon Street, Boston, MA

 

Reporter: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

4th Advancing Drug Development Forum – Making the Impossible Possible – Harnessing Small Molecule Drug Development scheduled to take place December 12th, 2019 at The University of Massachusetts Club, in Boston, Massachusetts from 8:30 AM – 8:30 PM.

http://advdrug.com/agenda/

 

Scientists are more than just chipping away and kicking down the barricades to develop complex small molecule products better and faster.  Successful companies are spending quality time finding novel and clever approaches and powerful technologies to better support their knowledgeable teams.  Often it takes establishing strong partnerships with 1 or more specialized service providers, cleverly combining resources – always striving to raise the bar in order to make life threatening diseases more of a chronic and tolerable disease or eradicated completely.

Hear from key opinion leaders in pharma, biotech, the investment community and innovative service providers on how they are meeting the challenges. Keep in mind, it takes being open-minded, flexible and willing sometimes to redesigning a new formulation that better enhances bioavailability, optimizes drug-delivery profiles, reduces dosing frequency, or improves the patient experience to have the potential to deliver quicker returns on investments than developing a completely new drug.

PROGRAM AGENDA Thursday, December 12, 2019
8:30 AM Registration and Networking Continental Breakfast
9:00 AM Welcome Address and Opening Remarks
Kevin Bittorf, Ph.D., & Shelly Amster
9:15 AM Opening VC Keynote
9:45 AM Bridging the Gap between Experimentation and Implementation
Panel Discussion
10:15 AM Refreshment Break
10:45 AM Cross-Talk Between Clin-Ops and Tech-Ops
Panel Discussion
11:15 AM The Cost of Speed and Value in Drug Development
Panel Discussion
12:00 PM Networking Luncheon
1:00 PM Advances in the Delivery of Therapeutics to the Brain
Academic Keynote
Mansoor M. Amiji, Ph.D., University Distinguished Professor, Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences & Professor of Chemical Engineering, Northeastern University
1:30 PM Advancing Drug Delivery and Controlled Release
Panel Discussion
2:00 PM Drowning in DATA
2:30 PM Disruptive AI Technologies Improving Drug Development
3:00 PM Refreshment Break
3:30 PM Small Specialty VS Full Service – What Makes Sense for US?
Panel Discussion
4:00 PM Fireside Chat
Michael Bonney, Executive Chair, Kaleido Biosciences
Heinrich Schlieker, Ph.D., SVP Technical Operations, Sage Therapeutics
5:00 PM – 8:00 PM Networking Social
Direct electronic communication with Shelly Amster

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Drug Repurposing Hub Library @broadinstitute @MIT @Harvard

Posted in Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, drug repurposing, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery on February 14, 2019| Leave a Comment »


Drug Repurposing Hub Library @broadinstitute @MIT @Harvard

Reporter: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN and Irina Robu, PhD

CLAIMER: most valuable information for Drug Repurposing is found in the following LPBI Group three Intellectual Property Asset Classes

Our intellectual property “IP” consists of three classes of assets as described in detail within live links in the below, listed article.

  • First, the Journal, an ongoing journal of curated, current biomedical research;
  • Second, the books, a collection of 16 volumes of e-books available via Amazon in five specialties of Medicine: Cardiovascular, Genomics, Cancer, Immunology and Precision Medicine; and
  • Third, real-time curation of biotech and medical conferences yielding an e-Proceedings at the end of the conference in One-click operation.

These three IP asset classes are described in details with live links in

eScientific Publishing a Case in Point: Evolution of Platform Architecture Methodologies and of Intellectual Property Development (Content Creation by Curation) Business Model

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2019/02/04/escientific-publishing-a-case-in-point-evolution-of-platform-architecture-methodologies-and-of-intellectual-property-development-content-creation-by-curation-business-model/

 

The Drug Repurposing Hub: A next-generation drug library and information resource

M Corsello, Steven & A Bittker, Joshua & Liu, Zihan & Gould, Joshua & McCarren, Patrick & E Hirschman, Jodi & E Johnston, Stephen & Vrcic, Anita & Wong, Bang & Khan, Mariya & Asiedu, Jacob & Narayan, Rajiv & C Mader, Christopher & Subramanian, Aravind & R Golub, Todd. (2017). The Drug Repurposing Hub: A next-generation drug library and information resource. Nature Medicine. 23. 405-408. 10.1038/nm.4306.

… Published on January 3, 2018 as DOI: 10.1124/mol.117. Downloaded from additional source, we used data from the Broad repurposing hub ( Corsello et al, 2017), which employed high throughput screening to characterize drug-target interactions of approved drugs, natural products and nutraceuticals along with other entities. Our analysis yielded a list of currently ‘druggable’ GPCRs and the drugs that target them. …
… Using a range of ~500 (conservative estimate) to ~700 GPCR-targeted drugs, we estimate that between ~25% and ~36% of approved drugs target GPCRs, with the upper figure the more likely. As additional studies such as the Broad repurposing initiative ( Corsello et al, 2017) characterize GPCR-drug interactions in more detail, we anticipate a growth in this number, as secondary interactions between GPCRs and drugs are defined ( Allen and Roth, 2011). IUPHAR lists more druggable GPCRs than CHEMBL or DRUGBANK but has the smallest number of GPCR-related and overall approved drugs ( Figure 3C shows the number of GPCR-targeted drugs based on target-ligand interactions annotated by either IUPHAR or CHEMBL; of the 476 such drugs listed in one or both sources, only a portion are common to both (50%). …

 

Drug Repurposing Hub Library @broadinstitute  @MIT @Harvard

To date there has not been a systematic effort to identify such opportunities, limited in part by the lack of a comprehensive library of clinical compounds suitable for testing. To address this challenge, we hand-curated a collection of 4,707 compounds, experimentally confirmed their identity, and annotated them with literature-reported targets. The collection includes 3,422 drugs that are marketed around the world or that have been tested in human clinical trials. Compounds were obtained from more than 50 chemical vendors and the purity of each sample was established. We have thus established a blueprint for others to easily assemble such a repurposing library, and we have created an online Drug Repurposing Hub (www.broadinstitute.org/repurposing) containing detailed annotation for each of the compounds.

SOURCE

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5568558/

. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2017 Aug 23.
Published in final edited form as:
PMCID: PMC5568558
NIHMSID: NIHMS893143
PMID: 28388612

The Drug Repurposing Hub: a next-generation drug library and information resource

Steven M. Corsello,1,2,3 Joshua A. Bittker,1 Zihan Liu,1 Joshua Gould,1Patrick McCarren,1 Jodi E. Hirschman,1 Stephen E. Johnston,1 Anita Vrcic,1Bang Wong,1 Mariya Khan,1 Jacob Asiedu,1 Rajiv Narayan,1Christopher C. Mader,1 Aravind Subramanian,1 and Todd R. Golub1,3,4,5,*
SOURCE
Other Resources

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Record Innovations in Drug Discovery by Koch Institute @MIT Members and Affiliates

Posted in BioTechnology - Venture Creation, BioTechnology - Venture Creation, Venture Capital, CANCER BIOLOGY & Innovations in Cancer Therapy, DNA repair, Drug Delivery Platform Technology, Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, MHC Repertoires for Antigen Prediction, Personalized and Precision Medicine & Genomic Research, Pharmaceutical Discovery on February 6, 2019| Leave a Comment »


Record Innovations in Drug Discovery by Koch Institute @MIT Members and Affiliates

Reporter: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

 

 

In Good Company

Trovagene announced a new patent for the use of the drug onvansertib in combination with other anti-androgen drugs for the treatment of prostate cancer. Last fall, Trovagene secured exclusive rights to develop combination therapies and clinical biomarkers for prostate cancer based in part on Bridge Project-funded research. Read more.

Lyndra Therapeutics, co-founded by KI member Bob Langer, raised $55 million in its Series B round, with new investors including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Gilead Sciences. Phase 2 trials for its ultra long-acting drug delivery capsule are expected to begin next year. Read more.

Dragonfly Therapeutics, co-founded by KI director Tyler Jacks, has committed $10 million to launch the first clinical studies of its TriNKETs (Tri-specific, NK cell Engager Therapies) platform for both solid tumor and hematological cancers. Read more.

Following its record-breaking IPO, Moderna Therapeutics (co-founded by KI member Bob Langer) published preclinical data in Science Translational Medicine demonstrating the promise of its mRNA-2752 program in several cancers. Read more.

Dewpoint Therapeutics launched with a $60 million Series A, aims to translate recent insights into biomolecular condensates from the laboratory of co-founder and KI member Rick Young to drug discovery. Read more.

KI member Bob Langer and collaborator Omid Farokhzad co-founded Seer— combining nanotechnology, protein chemistry, and machine learning—to develop liquid biopsy tests for the early detection of cancer and other diseases. Read more.

Epizyme, co-founded by KI member Bob Horvitz, is submitting a New Drug Application to gain accelerated approval of tazemetostat for patients with relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma. Read more.

Ribon Therapeutics, founded by former KI member Paul Chang, launched with $65 million in a Series B funding round with Victoria Richon, a veteran of Sanofi and Epizyme, at the helm. Ribon focuses on developing PARP7 inhibitors for cancer treatment. Read more.

SOURCE

From: MIT Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research <cancersolutions=mit.edu@cmail19.com> on behalf of MIT Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research <cancersolutions@mit.edu>

Reply-To: <ki-communications@mit.edu>

Date: Wednesday, February 6, 2019 at 3:15 PM

To: Aviva Lev-Ari <AvivaLev-Ari@alum.berkeley.edu>

Subject: Lung Microbiome Corrupted in Cancer; Angelika Amon wins 2019 Vilcek Award; Lunch Lines of Inquiry

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In 2018 Cardiovascular PharmacoTherapy Market: Anti-thrombotic Drug Class Segment will continue to bring in the biggest profit and dominate production

Posted in Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, Pharmaceutical Analytics, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery, Pharmaceutical Industry Competitive Intelligence, Pharmaceutical R&D Investment, Value-based Drug Pricing on February 27, 2018| Leave a Comment »


In 2018 Cardiovascular PharmacoTherapy Market: Anti-thrombotic Drug Class Segment will continue to bring in the biggest profit and dominate production

Reporter: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

Who were the top players in cardiovascular disease in 2017?

By GlobalData Healthcare

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CHI’s Discovery on Target, Sheraton Boston, Sept. 25-28, 2018

Posted in Conference Coverage with Social Media, Drug Delivery Platform Technology, Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, Personalized and Precision Medicine & Genomic Research, Pharmaceutical Analytics, Pharmaceutical Discovery, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery, Pharmaceutical Industry Competitive Intelligence, Pharmaceutical R&D Informatics, Pharmaceutical R&D Investment, Pharmacodynamics and Pharmacokinetics, Pharmacogenomics, Pharmacologic toxicities on February 21, 2018| Leave a Comment »


CHI’s Discovery on Target, Sheraton Boston, Sept. 25-28, 2018

Reporter: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

 

ANNOUNCEMENT

Leaders in Pharmaceutical Business Intelligence (LPBI) Group is a selected CHI Business Partner for Media Communication for this event as well a provider of REAL TIME PRESS COVERAGE for this cardinal event in the domain of  Drug Discovery and Drug Delivery.

Dr. Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN, Editor-in-Chief, PharmaceuticalIntelligence.com  will be in attendance covering this event for the Press using Social Media via 12 Channels

LOGO of LPBI Group

Follow us on ALL our Media Communication Channels:

Channels for e-Marketing of Biotech Conferences

  • Our Journal has 1,373,977  eReaders on 1/29/2018, for All Time and 7,283 Scientific Comments

http://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com

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http://twitter.com/pharma_BI

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For UPDATES on this Cardinal Conference and for REGISTRATION, go to 

http://www.discoveryontarget.com/?utm_source=partner

 

For PROGRAMS, go to 

http://www.discoveryontarget.com/programs

September 26-27

September 27-28

September 26-27

September 27-28

September 26-27

September 27-28

September 26-27

September 27-28

September 25

What is the Role of the Editor-in-Chief at PharmaceuticalIntelligence.com 

Editor-in-Chief’s Roles and Accomplishments

1        Curation Methodology Development

Leadership we provide on curation of scientific findings in the eScientific publishing for Medical Education contents.

In Section 1, the Leadership we provide on curation of scientific findings in the eScientific publishing for Medical Education contents is demonstrated by a subset of several outstanding curations with high electronic Viewer volume. Each article included presents unique content contribution to Medical Clinical Education.

·       These articles are extracted from the list of all Journal articles with >1,000 eReaders, 4/28/2012 to 1/29/2018.

Article Title,         # of electronic Viewers,         Author(s) Name

Is the Warburg Effect the Cause or the Effect of Cancer: A 21st Century View?                      16,114 Larry H. Bernstein, MD, FCAP

Do Novel Anticoagulants Affect the PT/INR? The Cases of XARELTO (rivaroxaban) and PRADAXA (dabigatran) 11,606 Vivek Lal, MBBS, MD, FCIR,

Justin D. Pearlman, MD, PhD, FACC and

Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN
Clinical Indications for Use of Inhaled Nitric Oxide (iNO) in the Adult Patient Market: Clinical Outcomes after Use, Therapy Demand and Cost of Care

 

  5,865 Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN
Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR-gamma) Receptors Activation: PPARγ transrepression for Angiogenesis in Cardiovascular Disease and PPARγ transactivation for Treatment of Diabetes                  1,919 Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN  

 

Bystolic’s generic Nebivolol – Positive Effect on circulating Endothelial Progenitor Cells Endogenous Augmentation  1,059 Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

 

Triple Antihypertensive Combination Therapy Significantly Lowers Blood Pressure in Hard-to-Treat Patients with Hypertension and Diabetes  1,339 Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

 

Clinical Trials Results for Endothelin System: Pathophysiological role in Chronic Heart Failure, Acute Coronary Syndromes and MI – Marker of Disease Severity or Genetic Determination?  1,472 Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN
Treatment of Refractory Hypertension via Percutaneous Renal Denervation  1,085 Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

2        Content Creation and Key Opinion Leader (KOL) Recognition

2.1     Volume of Articles in the Journal and in the 16 Volume-BioMed e-Series

Select

Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN 2012pharmaceutical

3,064 Articles

·       All  (5,288)

 avivalev-ari@alum.berkeley.edu Administrator 3064

2.1     Volume of Articles in the Journal and in the 16 Volume-BioMed e-Series

1.   Volume of Articles in the Journal since Journal inception on 4/28/2012:

·       Total articles by ALL authors in Journal Archive on 1/29/2018 = 5,288

·       ALL articles/posts Authored, Curated, Reported by Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN = 3,064

2.   Volume of Articles in the 16 Volume-BioMed e-Series

·    Editorial & Publication of Articles in e-Books by Leaders in Pharmaceutical Business Intelligence: Contributions of Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2014/10/16/editorial-publication-of-articles-in-e-books-by-leaders-in-pharmaceutical-business-intelligence-contributions-of-aviva-lev-ari-phd-rn/

·       LPBI Group’s Founder: Biography and Bibliographies – Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/founder/

 

2.2     Digital Presence measured by eViews: Clicks on article by Author Name

Top Authors for all days ending 2018-01-29 (Summarized)

All Time

Author Name electronic Views
Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN [2012pharmaceutical]

352,153

 

Our TEAM 5,934  

 
Founder 3,257
BioMed e-Series 3,140

 

Journal PharmaceuticalIntelligence.com 2,214
About 2,054
  VISION   2,803  

 


LPBI Group		             1,201

2.3     Digital KOL Parameters

Key Opinion Leader (KOL) – Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN, as Evidenced by

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2016/07/21/key-opinion-leader-kol-aviva-lev-ari-phd-rn-as-evidenced-by/

 

3        Team building: Editors and Expert, Authors, Writers

Our Team

Selection of Journal’s Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) and BioMed e-Series Content Consultant (CC): Series B, C, D, E

L.H. Bernstein, MD, FCAP

Editorial & Publication of Articles in e-Books by  Leaders in Pharmaceutical Business Intelligence:  Contributions of Larry H Bernstein, MD, FCAP

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2014/10/16/editorial-publication-of-articles-in-e-books-by-leaders-in-pharmaceutical-business-intelligence-contributions-of-larry-h-bernstein-md-fcap/

4        Book Title Generation and Cover Page Design

As BioMed e-Series Editor–in-Chief, I was responsible for the following functions of product design and product launch

·       16 Title creations for e-Books

·       Designed 16 Cover Pages for a 16-Volume e-Books e-Series in BioMed

·       Designed Series A eTOCs and approved of all 16 electronic Table of Contents (eTOCs), working in tandem with all the Editors of each volume and all the Author contributors of article contents in the Journal.

·       Commissioned Articles by Authors/Curators per Author’s expertise on a daily basis

 

Below, see Volume Titles and Cover Pages:

13 LIVE results for Kindle Store: “Aviva Lev-Ari”

 

 

The VOICES of Patients, Hospitals CEOs, Health Care Providers, Caregivers and Families: Personal Experience with Critical Care and Invasive Medical Procedures … E: Patient-Centered Medicine Book 1)

Oct 16, 2017 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein and Aviva Lev-Ari

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$49.00$ 49 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Cancer Therapies: Metabolic, Genomics, Interventional, Immunotherapy and Nanotechnology in Therapy Delivery (Series C Book 2)

May 13, 2017 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein and Demet Sag

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$100.00$ 100 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

The Immune System, Stress Signaling, Infectious Diseases and Therapeutic Implications: VOLUME 2: Infectious Diseases and Therapeutics and VOLUME 3: The … (Series D: BioMedicine & Immunology)

Sep 4, 2017 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein and Aviva Lev-Ari

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$115.00$ 115 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Perspectives on Nitric Oxide in Disease Mechanisms (Biomed e-Books Book 1)

Jun 20, 2013 | Kindle eBook

by Margaret Baker PhD and Tilda Barliya PhD

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

5 out of 5 stars 6

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Medical Scientific Discoveries for the 21st Century & Interviews with Scientific Leaders (Series E)

Dec 9, 2017 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein and Aviva Lev-Ari

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Etiologies of Cardiovascular Diseases: Epigenetics, Genetics and Genomics

Nov 28, 2015 | Kindle eBook

by Justin D. Pearlman MD ME PhD MA FACC and Stephen J. Williams PhD

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Cardiovascular Original Research: Cases in Methodology Design for Content Co-Curation: The Art of Scientific & Medical Curation

Nov 29, 2015 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein MD FCAP and Aviva Lev-Ari PhD RN

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Medical 3D BioPrinting – The Revolution in Medicine Technologies for Patient-centered Medicine: From R&D in Biologics to New Medical Devices (Series E: Patient-Centered Medicine Book 4)

Dec 30, 2017 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein and Irina Robu

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Metabolic Genomics & Pharmaceutics (BioMedicine – Metabolomics, Immunology, Infectious Diseases Book 1)

Jul 21, 2015 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein MD FCAP and Prabodah Kandala PhD

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

5 out of 5 stars 1

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Cancer Biology and Genomics for Disease Diagnosis (Series C: e-Books on Cancer & Oncology Book 1)

Aug 10, 2015 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H Bernstein MD FCAP and Prabodh Kumar Kandala PhD

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Genomics Orientations for Personalized Medicine (Frontiers in Genomics Research Book 1)

Nov 22, 2015 | Kindle eBook

by Sudipta Saha PhD and Ritu Saxena PhD

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Milestones in Physiology: Discoveries in Medicine, Genomics and Therapeutics (Series E: Patient-Centered Medicine Book 3)

Dec 26, 2015 | Kindle eBook

by Larry H. Bernstein MD FACP and Aviva Lev-Ari PhD RN

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

Regenerative and Translational Medicine: The Therapeutic Promise for Cardiovascular Diseases

Dec 26, 2015 | Kindle eBook

by Justin D. Pearlman MD ME PhD MA FACC and Ritu Saxena PhD

$0.00

Subscribers read for free.

Read for Free

$75.00$ 75 00 to buyKindle Edition

Get it TODAY, Jan 29

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC

5        Style Setting: Instruction manuals for Journal, Articles, Books

As BioMed e-Series Editor–in-Chief, Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN was responsible for

·       All the documentation (Instruction manuals) on Style setting, and for

·       Training all team members

·       Journal Articles Format

·       Journal Comment Exchange Format

·       e-Books Production Process:

1.               Volume creation from Journal’s Article Archive,

2.               Format Translation from HTML to .mobi for Kindle devices,

3.               Proof reading process,

4.               Title release,

5.               Book electronic Upload to Amazon.com Cloud.

6.               Connection of all articles and e-Books to Social Media, Ping back generation by mentioning other related articles published in the Journal

 

Lastly, 6, below

6        Annual Workflow Management of Multiple eTOCs – Multi-year Book Publishing Scheduling Plan, 2013 – Present

 

Title Date of Publication Number of Pages
Perspectives on Nitric Oxide in Disease Mechanisms 6/21/2013 895
Cardiovascular Original Research: Cases in Methodology Design for Content Co-Curation 11/30/2015 11039 KB
Etiologies of Cardiovascular Diseases: Epigenetics, Genetics and Genomics 11/29/2015 12333 KB
Regenerative and Translational Medicine: The Therapeutics Promise for Cardiovascular Diseases 12/26/2015 11668 KB
Genomics Orientations for Personalized Medicine 11/23/2015 11724 KB
Cancer Biology & Genomics for Disease Diagnosis 8/11/2015 13744 KB
Cancer Therapies: Metabolic, Genomics, Interventional, Immunotherapy and Nanotechnology in Therapy Delivery 5/18/2017 5408 pages
Metabolic Genomics and Pharmaceutics 7/21/2015 13927 KB
The Immune System, Stress    Signaling, Infectious Diseases and Therapeutic Implications 9/4/2017 3747 pages
The VOICES of Patients, Hospitals CEOs, Health Care Providers, Caregivers and Families: Personal Experience with Critical Care and Invasive Medical Procedures 10/16/2017 826 pages
Medical Scientific Discoveries for the 21st Century & Interviews with Scientific Leaders 12/9/2017 2862 pages
Milestones in Physiology: Discoveries in Medicine, Genomics and Therapeutics 12/27/2015 11125 KB
Medical 3D BioPrinting – The Revolution in Medicine, Technologies for Patient-centered Medicine: From R&D in Biologics to New Medical Devices 12/30/2017 1005 pages
Pharmacological Agents in Treatment of Cardiovascular Disease

 

 Work-in-Progress, Expected Publishing date in 2018 ???
Interventional Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery for Disease Diagnosis and Guidance of Treatment Work-in-Progress, Expected Publishing date in 2018

 

 ???

 

Read Full Post »

Novartis’ Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel), FDA approved genetically engineered immune cells, would charge $475,000 per patient, will use Programs that Payers will pay only for Responding Patients 

Posted in Drug Delivery Platform Technology, Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, Patient-centered Medicine, Personalized and Precision Medicine & Genomic Research, Pharmaceutical Discovery, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery, Pharmaceutical Industry Competitive Intelligence, Pharmaceutical R&D Informatics, Pharmaceutical R&D Investment, Pharmacogenomics, Value-based Drug Pricing on August 31, 2017| Leave a Comment »


Novartis’ Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel), FDA approved genetically engineered immune cells, would charge $475,000 per patient, will use Programs that Payers will pay only for Responding Patients

Curator: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

 

UPDATED on 9/1/2017:

This Pioneering $475,000 Cancer Drug Comes With A Money-Back Guarantee

Novartis defends the eye-popping price of its pioneering gene therapy with arguments about its $1 billion expenditure—and novel “value-based” pricing.

https://www.fastcompany.com/40461214/how-novartis-is-defending-the-record-475000-price-of-its-pioneering-gene-therapy-cancer-drug-car-t-kymriah

 

On 8/30/2017 we wrote:

FDA has approved the world’s first CAR-T therapy, Novartis for Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel) and Gilead’s $12 billion buy of KitePharma, no approved drug and Canakinumab for Lung Cancer (may be?)

Curator: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2017/08/30/fda-has-approved-the-worlds-first-car-t-therapy-novartis-for-kymriah-tisagenlecleucel-and-gileads-12-billion-buy-of-kite-pharma-no-approved-drug-and-canakinumab-for-lung-cancer-may-be/

 

The Price for the Treatment was published on 8/31/2017, a Value-based Pricing Payment Model of a $475,000 per patient charge for the responding patients after ONE month of treatment. Novartis says it takes an average of 22 days to create the therapy, from the time a patient’s cells are removed to when they are infused back into the patient. Kymriah will initially be available at 20 U.S. hospitals within a month, Novartis says. Eventually, 32 total sites will offer the therapy. 

CAR-T gained national attention three years ago when Carl June, a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania, used to put a young girl’s acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Genetically altering the girl’s immune cells had made her deathly ill, but June had used a Roche drug, Actemra, to treat the side effects. She lived, and the results were published in The New England Journal of Medicine. Novartis bought the rights to the Penn treatment for just $20 million up front.

Pharma Buying the right to use from an Academic Institution is a known route to leap frog the R&D lengthy process of Drug discovery.

“I’ve told the team that resources are not an issue. Speed is the issue,” says Novartis’ Chief Executive Joseph Jimenez, told Forbes in a cover story about the work then.

The FDA calls this CAR-T therapy treatment, made by Novartis, the “first gene therapy” in the U.S. The therapy is designed to treat an often-lethal type of blood and bone marrow cancer that affects children and young adults. The FDA defines gene therapy as a medicine that “introduces genetic material into a person’s DNA to replace faulty or missing genetic material” to treat a disease or medical condition. This is the first such therapy to be available in the U.S., according to the FDA.

Two gene therapies for rare, inherited diseases have already been approved in Europe.

To further evaluate the long-term safety, Novartis is also required to conduct a post-marketing observational study involving patients treated with Kymriah.

The FDA granted Kymriah Priority Review and Breakthrough Therapy designations. The Kymriah application was reviewed using a coordinated, cross-agency approach. The clinical review was coordinated by the FDA’s Oncology Center of Excellence, while CBER conducted all other aspects of review and made the final product approval determination.

The FDA granted approval of Kymriah to Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. The FDA granted the expanded approval of Actemra to Genentech Inc.

FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb in a statement.

“We’re entering a new frontier in medical innovation with the ability to reprogram a patient’s own cells to attack a deadly cancer,” 

“Kymriah is a first-of-its-kind treatment approach that fills an important unmet need for children and young adults with this serious disease,” said Peter Marks, M.D., Ph.D., director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER). “Not only does Kymriah provide these patients with a new treatment option where very limited options existed, but a treatment option that has shown promising remission and survival rates in clinical trials.”

https://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm574058.htm

The Protocol

A patient’s T cells are extracted and cryogenically frozen so that they can be transported to Novartis’s manufacturing center in New Jersey. There, the cells are genetically altered to have a new gene that codes for a protein—called a chimeric antigen receptor, or CAR. This protein directs the T cells to target and kill leukemia cells with a specific antigen on their surface. The genetically modified cells are then infused back into the patient.

In a clinical trial of 63 children and young adults with a type of acute lymphoblastic leukemia, 83 percent of patients that received the CAR-T therapy had their cancers go into remission within three months. At six months, 89 percent of patients who received the therapy were still living, and at 12 months, 79 percent had survived.

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608771/the-fda-has-approved-the-first-gene-therapy-for-cancer/?utm_campaign=add_this&utm_source=email&utm_medium=post

CAR-T Therapies: Product/Molecules/MOA under Development:

  • Similar CAR-T treatments were being developed at other institutions including
  • Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center,
  • Seattle Children’s Hospital, and
  • The National Cancer Institute.
  • The Memorial and Seattle work was spun off into a startup called Juno Therapeutics, which has fallen behind. Juno Therapeutics ended a CAR-T study earlier this year after patients died from cerebral edema, or swelling in the brain.
  • The NCI work became the basis for the product being developed by Kite Pharma. Kite Pharma, which is awaiting FDA approval for its CAR-T therapy to treat a form of blood cancer in adults, was this week bought out by Gilead in a deal worth $11.9 billion.

On Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s 4th Annual Adoptive T Cell Therapy, Delivering CAR, TCR, and TIL from Research to Reality, August 29 – 30, 2017 | Sheraton Boston | Boston, MA

TUESDAY, AUGUST 29 – I covered in Real Time the talk on Juno Therapeutics: Building Better T Cell Therapies: The Power of Molecular Profiling by Mark Bonyhadi, Ph.D., Head, Research and Academic Affairs, Juno Therapeutics

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2017/08/29/live-829-chis-oncolytic-virus-immunotherapy-and-adoptive-cell-therapy-august-28-29-2017-sheraton-boston-hotel-boston-ma/

 

Precision Medicine is Costly and not a Rapid manufacturing process

All of the CAR-T products are expensive to make, and must be manufactured on an individual basis for each new patient from the patient’s own T-cells, a type of white blood cells, a process that takes weeks.

  • How quickly companies can speed up manufacturing.
  • Kymriah will be manufactured at a facility in Morris Plains, N.J.
  • CAR-T technology, which has so far been used only in patients with blood cancers that have not been cured by other treatments, can be used earlier in the disease or for solid tumors: Breast, Prostate, Melanomas.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2017/08/30/fda-approves-novartis-treatment-that-alters-patients-cells-to-fight-cancer/#2aecb25b4400

Prediction How Patients will Far Well – Researchers use a big-data approach to find links between different genes and patient survival.

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608666/a-cancer-atlas-to-predict-how-patients-will-fare/?set=

A pathology atlas of the human cancer transcriptome

+ See all authors and affiliations

Science  18 Aug 2017:
Vol. 357, Issue 6352, eaan2507
DOI: 10.1126/science.aan2507

Modeling the cancer transcriptome

Recent initiatives such as The Cancer Genome Atlas have mapped the genome-wide effect of individual genes on tumor growth. By unraveling genomic alterations in tumors, molecular subtypes of cancers have been identified, which is improving patient diagnostics and treatment. Uhlen et al. developed a computer-based modeling approach to examine different cancer types in nearly 8000 patients. They provide an open-access resource for exploring how the expression of specific genes influences patient survival in 17 different types of cancer. More than 900,000 patient survival profiles are available, including for tumors of colon, prostate, lung, and breast origin. This interactive data set can also be used to generate personalized patient models to predict how metabolic changes can influence tumor growth.

Read Full Post »

FDA has approved the world’s first CAR-T therapy, Novartis for Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel) and Gilead’s $12 billion buy of Kite Pharma, no approved drug and Canakinumab for Lung Cancer (may be?)

Posted in CANCER BIOLOGY & Innovations in Cancer Therapy, CAR-T, Drug Development Process, Drug Discovery Chemistry, Immuno-Oncology & Genomics, Immunotherapy, Personalized and Precision Medicine & Genomic Research, Pharmaceutical Analytics, Pharmaceutical Discovery, Pharmaceutical Drug Discovery, Pharmacogenomics on August 30, 2017| Leave a Comment »


FDA has approved the world’s first CAR-T therapy, Novartis for Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel) and Gilead’s $12 billion buy of Kite Pharma, no approved drug and Canakinumab for Lung Cancer (may be?)

Curator: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

 

UPDATED on 12/10/2019

For an ‘acquisitive’ Gilead, 2020 will be key test for CAR-T plans

Success for Kite, which O’Day made an independent unit, is critical for Gilead. Not only did the California biotech invest a large sum to buy the CAR-T specialist, it’s the most notable bet made on a future outside of drugs for HIV and hepatitis C.

Sentiment on Wall Street has begun to turn against the wisdom of Gilead’s choice, doubting CAR-T will live up to the promise envisioned by O’Day’s predecessors. One analyst went so far as to include the acquisition among the five most value-destroying biopharma deals of the past decade.

Commercially, sales of Yescarta have grown to $334 million through the first nine months of the year, up from $183 million during the same period last year. Still, marketing CAR-T has proved challenging, with hurdles in reimbursement and in-hospital administration particularly acute.

The coming year could prove consequential in shifting Kite’s trajectory higher.

Within the next few weeks, Gilead will ask regulators to approve its second CAR-T cell therapy, a variation of its currently cleared leukemia and lymphoma treatment Yescarta that’s manufactured differently.

A new site in Europe coming online next year could substantially cut times down for Yescarta delivery there, Shaw said. (Globally, Novartis appears better positioned, with sites in Switzerland and France as well as partnerships in China, Japan and Australia.)

Automation of what’s now a mostly manual process will play an important role in CAR-T’s future too, according to Shaw.

“If we get our autologous cell therapy automated very well, you could imagine one day it could be at point of care,” she said. “We don’t want to be disrupted by someone else doing that.”

Disruption could also come in the form of allogeneic cell therapies, which are constructed using donor T cells rather than autologous treatments that use a patient’s own. Numerous clinical hurdles have made that approach more difficult but companies like Allogene — founded by former Kite executives — are moving ahead.

SOURCE

https://www.biopharmadive.com/news/gilead-kite-car-t-christi-shaw-dealmaking/568767/

 

UPDATED on 5/3/2019

Gilead Sciences tapped new CEO Daniel O’Day in part because of his cancer expertise. But he’s not planning to lead the company’s oncology ramp-up alone.

The Roche veteran intends to bring on a CEO for Gilead’s Kite unit, responsible for key CAR-T drug Yescarta. The new chief will report to O’Day and operate Kite as a separate business unit, JPMorgan analyst Cory Kasimov wrote in a Thursday note to clients.

RELATED: Gilead, looking for cancer sales, swipes Roche pharma chief Daniel O’Day for CEO post

Gilead acquired Kite in 2017 for $12 billion as its hepatitis C revenues, once its bread and butter, crashed. But so far, both Yescarta and Novartis’ rival CAR-T player, Kymriah, have struggled, thanks to a mix of reimbursement and manufacturing challenges.

Kite underperformed expectations once again in the first quarter, with Yescarta’s $96 million in sales for the period checking in below Wall Street consensus of $105 million.

O’Day doesn’t expect to see that trend continue, though. On Gilead’s earnings conference call, he “proclaimed his confidence in cell therapy, noting that it was a critical element of the company’s long term strategy,” Kasimov wrote.

Getting Gilead’s commercial business in order is just one of O’Days three main priorities as he settles into the CEO role, though. After taking the reins March 1, he decided to zero in on strengthening Gilead’s pipeline, in part through M&A. And he’ll also be making organizational tweaks to “ensure the right people are in the right place,” as Kasimov put it.

Gilead is “continuing to scan the entirety” of the M&A landscape and “acknowledges they will continue to ‘look at late stage pipeline,’” while keeping an eye on the company’s areas of expertise—oncology, HIV and hepatitis B and nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, Jefferies analyst Michael Yee wrote to his own clients. And the Big Biotech will be “accelerating internal” candidates in addition to adding bolt-on buys.

RELATED: Gilead executives predict patience—and some deal scouting—from new CEO Daniel O’Day

Unsurprisingly, analysts trained their attention on the call to O’Day’s strategy comments, and “there were literally minimal to no questions about financials,” Yee noted. But that doesn’t mean Gilead turned in a bad quarter. On the contrary, the first quarter was “fairly clean,” he wrote, with revenues of $5.28 billion meeting expectations and earnings per share of $1.76 topping forecasts by 15 cents.

New HIV hotshot Biktarvy stole the show on the revenue side, blowing the $648 million consensus prediction out of the water with $793 million in quarterly sales.

In the quarter, “about 80% of Biktarvy revenue came from switches with 25% from dolutegravir-containing regimens in the U.S.,” Kasimov wrote, referencing key combinations from Gilead’s HIV archrival, GlaxoSmithKline.

SOURCE

 

UPDATED on 9/7/2017

Here’s the inside account of Gilead’s 11-week sprint to its $12B Kite buyout – ENDPOINTS NEWS

UPDATED on 8/31/2017

Gilead-Kite: A New Transformative Deal For Biotech, AUG 30, 2017

Gilead has made a big bet on new technology in Kite’s immunotherapy platforms and has reduced the number of credible large players in the space.

With a reputation for intense diligence and dynamism in its business development efforts, Gilead’s management team will only bolster the immunotherapy field as it prepares to face off with Novartis, its immediate competitor, and enters squarely in the province of Merck and Bristol Myers Squibb, two of the leaders in immuno-oncology.

Gilead has reinvented the transformative transaction for the sector.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephenbrozak/2017/08/30/gilead-kite-a-new-transformative-deal-and-maybe-the-new-future-of-healthcare-deals/#fc64fca65d49

 

I attended this week the Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s 4th Annual

Adoptive T Cell Therapy

Delivering CAR, TCR, and TIL from Research to Reality
August 29 – 30, 2017 | Sheraton Boston | Boston, MA

 

The following talks on 8/29/2017 presented the frontier of CAR-T Therapies and Technologies from lab to bed side:

  • Building Better T Cell Therapies: The Power of Molecular Profiling

Mark Bonyhadi, Ph.D., Head, Research and Academic Affairs, Juno Therapeutics

  • Tricked-Out Cars, the Next Generation of CAR T Cells

Richard Morgan, Ph.D., Vice President, Immunotherapy, Bluebird Bio

  • The Generation of Lentiviral Vector-Modified CAR-T Cells Using an Automated Process

Boro Dropulic, Ph.D., General Manager and CSO, Lentigen Technology, Inc.

I covered this event in Real Time for the Press

LIVE – 8/29 – CHI’s Oncolytic Virus Immunotherapy and ADOPTIVE CELL THERAPY, August 28-29, 2017 Sheraton Boston Hotel | Boston, MA

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2017/08/29/live-829-chis-oncolytic-virus-immunotherapy-and-adoptive-cell-therapy-august-28-29-2017-sheraton-boston-hotel-boston-ma/

 

One year ago we published the following:

What does this mean for Immunotherapy? FDA put a temporary hold on Juno’s JCAR015, Three Death of Celebral Edema in CAR-T Clinical Trial and Kite Pharma announced Phase II portion of its CAR-T ZUMA-1 trial

https://pharmaceuticalintelligence.com/2016/07/09/what-does-this-mean-for-immunotherapy-fda-put-a-temporary-hold-on-jcar015-three-death-of-celebral-edema-in-car-t-clinical-trial-and-kite-pharma-announced-phase-ii-portion-of-its-car-t-zuma-1-trial/

 

reported on Aug. 28, 2017 that Gilead just handed a revolutionary kind of cancer treatment a $12 billion endorsement.

For Gilead, which is known for its HIV and hepatitis C medications, this is an entirely new area of cancer development.

“The field of cell therapy has advanced very quickly, to the point where the science and technology have opened a clear path toward a potential cure for patients,” Gilead CEO John Milligan said in a news release. “We are greatly impressed with the Kite team and what they have accomplished, and share their belief that cell therapy will be the cornerstone of treating cancer.”

In July, a Food and Drug Administration panel voted in favor of approving one of these treatments made by Novartis. One of the panelists called it “most exciting thing I’ve seen in my lifetime.” The FDA is expected to decide whether to approve that therapy, a treatment for pediatric acute lymphoblastic lymphoblastic leukemia, by October.

Gilead won’t have to wait long to see if the FDA will approve Kite’s leading cell therapy, which is called axicabtagene ciloleucel or axi-cel. In November, Kite is expected to get an answer from the FDA regarding its CAR-T treatment for a type of blood cancer called aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma. In data Kite released in February, the company found that out of 101 patients, 36% had a complete response to the treatment after six months.

The one-time treatments won’t come cheap. While companies might price the drug based on how well it works, axi-cel’s price tag could still be $325,000. Analysts expect the therapy to generate $1.7 billion in sales by 2022.

While its axi-cel program is the farthest along, Kite’s also working on another CAR-T cell therapy that’s in clinical trialsto treat multiple myeloma, another form of blood cancer. The company’s also working on cell therapies to treat solid tumors that are still in early clinical trials.

On August 30, 2017, John Carroll writes: 

[A]pproval marks a major shift in oncology, with a truly revolutionary approach to treating cancer.

The FDA has approved the world’s first CAR-T therapy, giving a green light to Novartis for Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel) in what regulators themselves describe as an historic event.

The accelerated approval — about a month ahead of the PDUFA date — came through for certain pediatric and young adult patients with a form of acute lymphoblastic leukemia

Novartis, the leader in the field, which will set the price on this therapy and likely those to come. Novartis’ investigators registered a game-changing 83% remission rate in its pivotal study.

CAR-T, though, is also associated with severe and potentially deadly side effects, including lethal instances of cytokine release syndrome with some patients dying from brain swelling in separate studies from the Novartis drug.

Regulators noted that they will require special training for anyone involved in delivering this therapy, while expanding the approval of Actemra (tocilizumab) to treat CAR T-cell-induced severe or life-threatening CRS in patients 2 years of age or older. “In clinical trials in patients treated with CAR-T cells,” the FDA reported, “69% of patients had complete resolution of CRS within two weeks following one or two doses of Actemra.”

Said Joseph Jimenez, CEO of Novartis:

“Five years ago, we began collaborating with the University of Pennsylvania and invested in further developing and bringing what we believed would be a paradigm-changing immunocellular therapy to cancer patients in dire need. With the approval of Kymriah, we are once again delivering on our commitment to change the course of cancer care.”

This approval marks a major shift in oncology, with a truly revolutionary approach to treating cancer. That hasn’t escaped the notice of big players and small, with a host of developers looking to do much better, more safely, with new drugs in the pipeline.

SOURCE

From: “John Carroll [Endpoints News]” <john@endpointsnews.com>

Reply-To: <john@endpointsnews.com>

Date: Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 11:27 AM

To: Aviva Lev-Ari <AvivaLev-Ari@alum.berkeley.edu>

Subject: BREAKING: FDA ushers in a new era in cancer treatment with ‘historic’ CAR-T approval for Novartis

Novartis’ Canakinumab – NEW Inflammation hypothesis of lung cancer

When researchers looked at the safety profile of canakinumab, they found something amazing — a major reduction in the risk of fatal cancers. This was driven by an effect of the highest dose of the drug to prevent lung cancer. The 300 mg dose reduced the occurrence of lung cancer by 67% and death from lung cancer by 77%. It was Viagra all over again.

SOURCE

Is Canakinumab the Next Viagra?

In this Revolution and Revelation, Milton Packer explains how safety data can sometimes trump a primary endpoint

by Milton PackerAugust 30, 2017

https://www.medpagetoday.com/Blogs/RevolutionandRevelation/67605

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Genomic Diagnostics: Three Techniques to Perform Single Cell Gene Expression and Genome Sequencing Single Molecule DNA Sequencing

Posted in Analytical Instruments Industry, Bio Instrumentation in Experimental Life Sciences Research, BioIT: BioInformatics, NGS, Clinical & Translational, Pharmaceutical R&D Informatics, Clinical Genomics, Cancer Informatics, Biological Networks, Gene Regulation and Evolution, Biomarkers & Medical Diagnostics, Biomedical Measurement Science, Cell Biology, Cell Biology, Signaling & Cell Circuits, Computational Biology/Systems and Bioinformatics, DNA repair, Drug Discovery Chemistry, Gene Regulation and Evolution, Genetics & Innovations in Treatment, Genome Biology, Genomic Testing: Methodology for Diagnosis, Meta-analysis of transcriptome data, Microfuidics, Transcriptomics, tagged , , , , , on July 4, 2017| Leave a Comment »


Genomic Diagnostics: Three Techniques to Perform Single Cell Gene Expression and Genome Sequencing Single Molecule DNA Sequencing

Curator: Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN

 

This article presents Three Techniques to Perform Single Cell Gene Expression and Genome Sequencing Single molecule DNA sequencing

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