The share prices of blue-chip biopharmaceutical companies continued on their lackluster trajectory, which started in June and collectively lost ground last month, with the BioWorld Biopharmaceutical index slipping about 1.3% as investors took a break in order to digest the deluge of COVID-19 vaccine data released during the period and the impact on the bottom lines that the pandemic has exerted among those companies that have reported their second-quarter results.

Out of the $10.45 billion brought into the biopharma industry this year by way of collaborations with nonprofit entities or through grants, 80% is focused on COVID-19 therapeutics and vaccines.

BioWorld looks at translational medicine, including: Picturing molecular alterations; Fishing for druggable osteoporosis targets; First mouse-adapted strain of SARS-CoV-2; Transplanted iPSCs are best of both ApoE models; TXNIP inhibition nixes T2D; Degradation approach targets extracellular proteins; Tryptophan metabolites keep gut barrier strong; Honest placebos change brain potentials; Screening in serum yields active antibiotics.

Six months to the day that the World Health Organization (WHO) declared it a public health emergency, the SARS-CoV-2 virus, with its hideous red spikes, continues to taunt the world, hopping from host to host and haunting humans, many of whom wonder the same thing: What’s next?