A University of Maryland School of Medicine team has used a toll-like receptor 4 antagonist to treat influenza in mice.1 The results provide a repurposing opportunity for Eisai Co. Ltd.'s toll-like receptor 4 blocker Eritoran, originally developed for sepsis, and could extend to treating respiratory infections beyond the flu.
Vaccines and antivirals-namely neuraminidase inhibitors-provide the standard of care for influenza. But the limited efficacy of vaccines together with the increasing resistance to antivirals and their short therapeutic window has spurred a need for alternative strategies.
About a year after U.S. researchers developed small molecule inhibitors of the intractable target wild-type Ras, a Japanese team has identified compounds that hit Ras mutant tumors in mice. The team now is trying to ramp up the potency of the compounds and make the structures more drug-like.
Boston researchers have used the CRISPR-Cas9 genome modification platform to simultaneously engineer mutations into multiple genes in mice. The results from the rapid, one-step process provide the best evidence to date for the potential of this method to revolutionize the creation of complex disease models.
Separate groups at Case Western and Stanford have developed approaches to directly reprogram rodent fibroblasts into oligodendrocyte progenitor cells. Although the method could be a safe and fast way to supply cells for myelination disorder cell therapies, the teams need to show that their methods also reprogram human fibroblasts.
Enhancing IL-7 activity in autoimmune disease and antiviral immunity; improving immunotherapies for multiple myeloma with CEACAM6 inhibitors; preventing liver fibrosis with VDR agonists; and more...
Single-molecule analysis of epigenetic markers; bioluminescent mice to monitor progression of muscular dystrophy; use of CD49B and CD223 to isolate type 1 Treg cells; and more...
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