All of these were reported over the past month:
• A new pancreatic cancer drug, daraxonrasib, that roughly doubles survival in late-stage disease
• A precision lung cancer drug, lorlatinib, that kept 55 percent of patients progression-free after 7 years, versus 3 percent on the old drug
• A prostate cancer drug, talazoparib, that halves the risk of progression
• An endometrial cancer drug, dostarlimab, where 58 percent of patients hadn't progressed after 4 years, versus 16 percent on chemo alone
• An early-detection blood test, the NHS Galleri test, that quadrupled cancer detection but missed its main goal
• An mRNA cancer vaccine that halved the risk of melanoma recurrence when added to Keytruda
• The most effective weight loss drug so far, retatrutide, which cut body weight by about 28 percent
• The first in vivo gene editing therapy, which cut hereditary angioedema attacks by 87 percent from a single injection
• A one-time gene edit, VERVE-102, that lowered LDL cholesterol by 62 percent
• A feat of pharmaceutical synthesis that raised enlicitide's manufacturing yield 14-fold using engineered enzymes
• A functional cure for hepatitis B, bepirovirsen, that cleared the virus in about 20 percent of patients
• The discovery that human cells can swap chromosome-sized DNA through nanotubes
• An ancestor of CRISPR, VIPR, found in bacteriophages, that silences genes without cutting DNA
• A preventive Covid-19 pill, ensitrelvir, that cut symptom risk by 67 percent after exposure
• The first PROTAC drug, vepdegestrant, which destroys a disease-causing protein rather than blocking it
Every month, Niko and I write a round up digging into the latest news in biotech and medicine, and this month's was astonishing.
We share some thoughts on what's responsible for this progress and what it means for science in the future.
New post!
@NikoMcCarty and I have been writing regular round ups for a little while now, but so much has happened recently that this month’s What's New in Biology post feels like it contains a year’s worth of breakthroughs.
worksinprogress.news/p/whats…
The most effective weight-loss drug so far, cancer breakthroughs, gene editing for cholesterol, ancestral CRISPR systems, a cure for some with hepatitis B, the first PROTAC drug, and more.
Read it here!