Topic
Design and delivery of synthetic messenger RNA for vaccines, cancer immunotherapy and protein-replacement treatment.
TU Darmstadt researchers have explained how their lab-built G12 riboswitch senses doxycycline and switches genes on or off in yeast and human cells. The Nature Communications paper could let a well-tolerated antibiotic act as an external control for gene expression.
Reality
Georgia Tech and Emory researchers found the gut site where a lipid-nanoparticle mRNA dose lands, cheek to rectum, changes which organs it reaches in mice. That turns the delivery site into a tool for aiming oral vaccines at lymph nodes or GLP-1 therapy at the pancreas.
Reality
Intismeran autogene plus Keytruda beat Keytruda alone in resected melanoma. The market added roughly $35bn to Moderna on a result the companies described only in adjectives.
Perspective Coverage
6 publishersReality
Intismeran autogene met both primary endpoints in a 1,137-patient melanoma trial. Every dose is built from one tumour's sequence, which turns approval into a question about process, not product.
Perspective Coverage
3 publishersReality
The companies say intismeran plus Keytruda slowed melanoma's return after surgery in the first randomized Phase 3 test of neoantigen vaccines. No detailed data has been released.
Perspective Coverage
4 publishersReality
Ninety percent of drug candidates that reach human trials are never approved. A Norwegian group argues some of that triage belongs in donor blood, where nanoparticles meet the plasma proteins and immune cells that settle their fate.
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Johns Hopkins and NIH researchers report faster, cleaner translation from an alternative mRNA modification than from the chemistry used in COVID-19 mRNA vaccines. Dose economics is the open question.
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In mice, a peptide-PEG agent given before dosing cut liver expression several dozenfold and raised spleen expression severalfold, according to work in ACS Nano.
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A screen of 337 virus genomes found stabilizing elements; one, Pt1, pushed linear mRNA half-life from 7.6 to 23.1 hours by recruiting nuclear poly(A) polymerases in the cytoplasm.
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