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The Bio Report podcast, hosted by award-winning journalist Daniel Levine, focuses on the intersection of biotechnology with business, science, and policy.
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Antimicrobial resistance is projected to kill up to 10 million people a year by 2050. One particular area of concern is drug-resistant gonorrhea, where existing therapies are being exhausted. Taxis Pharmaceutics is developing therapies to combat evolving superbugs by targeting their cellular infrastructure and disrupting the mechanisms that fuel antimicrobial resistance. We spoke to Greg Mario, president and CEO of Taxis, about the public health threat posed by drug-resistant gonorrhea, the approaches it’s taking to develop new antimicrobial treatments, and the need for new funding models to bring new therapies to market.
Brain tumors are difficult to treat in part because of the blood-brain barrier, the need to protect healthy and sensitive tissue surrounding tumors, and the limits of existing therapies. While there have been great advances in other types of cancer, there’s been relatively little progress in treating these CNS tumors. Plus Therapeutic is developing targeted radiotherapies that provide high doses of radiation directly into the tumor with a catheter. The approach enables the delivery of higher doses of radiation while minimizing exposure to healthy brain cells. We spoke to Marc Hedrick, president and CEO of Plus Therapeutics, about the challenges of treating brain tumors, the limitations of current therapies, and why the company’s targeted radiotherapies have the potential to create better outcomes for patients.
Macrocycles are complex compounds that can interact with targets that are often unreachable with traditional small molecules. Orbis Medicines is addressing the challenge with its nCycles, synthetic macrocycle drugs that are orally available but hit targets that would otherwise require biologic therapies. We spoke to Morten Graugaard, CEO of Orbis Medicines, about its class of synthetic macrocycles called nCycles, its platform technology to generate and screen these therapies, and how they can offer an orally-delivered alternative to biologics.
Animal testing for experimental therapies is slow, expensive, and an imperfect predictor for how a drug will act in humans. The Foundation for the National Institutes of Health in July announced a program to advance innovative laboratory technologies that model human biology, enabling faster, less expensive testing. We spoke to Stacey Adam, vice president of scientific partnerships for the FNIH and leader of the public-private partnership, about the new program, the technologies being explored, and what it will take to transform biomedical research with better disease models.
Many cancer patients are prescribed opioids to manage pain associated with their disease, but studies have shown that the use of these pain killers naturally mutes the immune response and can reduce the efficacy of immunotherapies. Glycyx Therapeutics is developing a drug it believes can allow opioids to relieve pain while preventing them from working against immunotherapies. We spoke to Lorin Johnson, chief scientific officer of Glycyx Therapeutics, about the effect of opioids on the immune system, the company’s experimental therapy designed to mitigate the negative effects of opioids in cancer patients being treated with checkpoint inhibitors, and why its drug in development may promote gut health in these patients more broadly.
When Takeda in 2023 paid Nimbus Therapeutics $4 billion upfront and the potential for two additional $1 billion milestone payments for its experimental TYK2 inhibitor, the deal was an eye-popping validation of Nimbus’ approach. The company, an early innovator in a computational chemistry, has now integrated AI into its approach to drug discovery. And though it’s been an innovator in technology, it’s also been an innovator in its portfolio approach as an early example of an effective use of a hub-and-spoke business model. We spoke to Abbas Kazimi, CEO of Nimbus, about computational chemistry, how the company’s drug discovery approach has evolved with AI, and how its business model provides liquidity to investors and while making it easier to structure deals.
Despite the successes of immunotherapies to date, about 75 to 80 percent of cancer patients don’t respond to current immunotherapy treatments. Faron Pharmaceuticals is hoping to help change that with its experimental therapy bexmarilimab, which is in development to treat myelodysplastic syndrome. Bexmarilimab targets CLEVER-1, a checkpoint inhibitor found on macrophages, a type of myeloid cell that plays an essential role in the immune system. We spoke to Juho Jalkanen, founder and CEO of Faron, about how the tumor microenvironment can suppress macrophages, how the company’s macrophage checkpoint inhibitor works, and the challenges a Finland-based company faces accessing the capital markets.
There’s been a stunning lack of innovation around male contraceptives when it comes to the area of male contraceptives. Men have the choice between a vasectomy, a procedure innovated in the 19th century, or condoms, which date back to at least King Minos in Crete in 3000 BCE. Next Life Sciences is hoping to change that with its Plan A, an experimental hydrogel that is injected into the vas deferens and provides a barrier that prevents sperm from passing. Plan A, which is regulated as a medical device, is expected to be easily reversible. We spoke to Darlene Walley, CEO of Next Life Sciences, about Plan A, the need it is addressing, and why she expects men and women to see it as a welcome alternative to current choices.
There have been great advances in the treatment of hepatitis C with the advent of curative therapies, but hepatitis B has proven far more elusive. That’s due to differences in the way the virus replicates and how it creates a reservoir of viral DNA in the cells in the liver. nChroma Bio, the result of a merger between Chroma Medicine and Nvelop Therapeutics, thinks it has an answer. It’s developing a one-and-done epigenetic editing therapy that silences hepatitis B viral transcription. We spoke to nChroma Bio chief development officer Jenny Marlowe and chief scientific officer Melissa Bonner, about its experimental epigenetic editor for hepatitis B, the merger that brought together the two companies, and how it plans to leverage Chroma’s epigenetic editing platform with Nvelop’s programmable non-viral delivery technologies in future therapies.
While AI has been seductive in its promise for revolutionizing drug development, one of the constraints remains the quality of the data that is used by any given platform. BPG Bio, an early innovator in the application of AI to drug development as Berg, is taking what it calls a “biology-first” approach. It capitalizes on its proprietary biobank to conduct multi-omics analysis to understand the biological mechanisms of diseases. We spoke to Niven Narain, CEO of BPGbio, about how the company’s platform technology uncovers novel targets, its evolution from its start as Berg, and how the platform continues to provide insight into experimental therapies after they advance to the clinic.
1Despite the market success of GLP-1 agonists to treat obesity, many patients suffer side effects such as nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting. These medicines also cause significant loss of muscle mass. And when someone discontinues use, they often regain the weight they lost. Skye Bioscience is developing nimacimab, an experimental therapy that has the potential to induce weight loss by inhibiting the CB1 receptor. Because of its different target, it may be able to be used in conjunction with GLP-1 agonists and lower the dose of those drugs to make them more tolerable, or combined with other therapeutic approaches. We spoke to Punit Dhillon, president and CEO of Skye Bioscience, about CB1 as a target for treating obesity, its experimental therapy nimacimab, and the potential to combine it with GLP-1 agonists and other therapeutic approaches.
Many companies are seeking to develop non-opioid treatments for pain, but Persica Pharmaceuticals may be taking a surprising approach for chronic low-back pain. The company’s lead experimental therapy for the condition is an antibiotic. That may sound odd, but it turns out that about half of chronic low back pain cases are due to bacterial infections that occur after herniation of the spinal disc or injury. We spoke to Steve Ruston, CEO of Persica Pharmaceuticals, about the need for new approaches to chronic low back pain, the company’s experimental targeted intradiscal antibiotic injections, and the need to educate physicians about the role infection can play in the condition.
Though there are plenty of therapeutic alternatives for asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, or COPD, there are no approved biologics for treating acute exacerbations of these conditions. Connect Biopharma believes that’s an opportunity. It's experimental therapy rademikibart has shown promise treating exacerbations and providing sustained improvements. We spoke to Barry Quart, CEO of Connect Biopharma, about the unmet need the company is seeking to address, how rademikibart works, and Connect’s repositioning as a U.S.-centric company.
When Vanderbilt University Medical Center began to consider how big data and precision medicine were going to impact both research and development and clinical care, it struck on the idea of building a large-scale biobank and tying it to its store of millions of electronic health records. That ultimately led to the founding of Nashville Bioscience, a for-profit subsidiary of the medical center. We spoke to Leeland Ekstrom, co-founder and CEO of NashBio, about the company’s data collection methods, the significance of the alliance it's developed with leading biopharmaceutical companies, and how it's enabling a transformation of drug development with data.
Spirulina, also known as blue-green algae, is edible. It can be engineered to cost-effectively produce biologics that can be taken orally. Though people have long sought to do this, Lumen Bioscience has developed platform technology that solved the various challenges is engineering spirulina to produce medicines. We spoke to Brian Finrow, co-founder and CEO of Lumen, about the company’s platform technology, why it makes possible the pursuit of biologics for indications that were previously not practical, and the potential to make these advanced therapies affordable and accessible in parts of the world where people may not have widely enjoyed their benefits.
Cancer is a global disease, and BeOne Medicines believes it should develop its cancer therapies for global markets. To do so, it’s taking innovative approaches to clinical trials, pricing, and manufacturing to enable it to support patients not only in high-income countries but also in low- and middle-income countries. We spoke to Matt Shaulis, general manager of North America for BeOne Medicines, about the significant global disparities in cancer care, the mission of BeOne Medicines to improve access and affordability to therapies, and the opportunities and challenges of taking a global approach to marketing innovative medicines.
The advent of immunotherapies is transforming cancer care. While early efforts have focused on enabling T cells to attack cancers, Myeloid Therapeutics is developing next-generation immunotherapies that use mRNA to train myeloid cells to attack cancer. We spoke to Daniel Getts, founder and CEO of Myeloid Therapeutics, about the limitations of existing immunotherapies, the role myeloid cells play in the immune system, and the benefits of the company’s therapeutic approach.
Despite having taken steps to prepare for a possible pandemic, the United States fared poorly during the COVID outbreak relative to other developed nations. It also sharpened political divides as conspiracy theories and misinformation spread on social media. In “COVID Wars: America’s Struggle Over Public Health and Personal Freedom,” tech entrepreneur-turned-historian Ronald Gruner takes a deep dive into the public data surrounding the pandemic. We spoke to Gruner about putting the pandemic in historical perspective, what the data showed, and the lessons to be learned.
GLP-1 agonists have been a breakthrough for the treatment of obesity, a global problem with serious health risks. While the benefits of these therapies are seen as outweighing the risks, there have been some concerns about the loss of muscle mass, particularly in older people using these drugs. iBio is developing next-generation obesity therapies that may be able to be used in combination with GLP-1 agonists or by themselves. Its lead experimental therapy is a myostatin inhibitor, part of a class of therapies that have been of interest to treat muscle wasting. We spoke to Martin Brenner, CEO and chief scientific officer of iBIO, about obesity, the limits of GLP-1 agonists, and the potential for myostatin inhibitors alone or in combination with GLP-1 agonists.
At the end of 2024, the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health awarded a team led by the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, and including the Foundation Fighting Blindness and six other research groups, up to $46 million to advance research to enable human eye transplants to restore vision in people who are blind. The goal of the project is to make whole eye transplantation a reality by 2030. We spoke to Kia Washington, the project’s principal investigator and professor of surgery at the University of Colorado School of Medicine; and Chad Jackson, senior director of preclinical translational research at the Foundation Fighting Blindness about why no one has been able to restore vision through whole eye transplantation yet, the technological advancements that now put the goal in reach, and why maintaining and restoring the optic nerve remains a central challenge.
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