The brain is plastic throughout life, but never more so than from birth to young adulthood. It increases its volume by developing dendrites and axons that connect neurons in to each other, forming new pathways to process the information that it will store. Those connections require maintenance. And if a connection is unsuccessful, better to delete it than to keep it. This is known as synaptic pruning and occurs from childhood to the age of 20. Now, a group of scientists from the University of Cambridge and Fudan University has described a neuropsychopathological (NP) factor that explains why inappropriate pruning in adolescence is related to mental health disorders.

Additional early-stage research and drug discovery news in brief, from: Dyve Biosciences, Eyevensys, Palatin Technologies, Sernova, Valitor, Zyversa Therapeutics.

Viva Star Biosciences (Suzhou) Co. Ltd. has identified substituted sulfonylurea compounds acting as NLRP3 inflammasome inhibitors and reported to be useful for the treatment of cryopyrin-associated periodic syndrome, multiple sclerosis, atherosclerosis, type 2 diabetes, osteoarthritis, cancer, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.

Son of sevenless homolog 1 (SOS1) inhibitors have been detailed in a Shanghai Allist Pharmaceuticals Co. Ltd. patent and described as useful for the treatment of cancer, arteriovenous malformations, cardiofaciocutaneous syndrome, Costello syndrome, Legius syndrome (neurofibromatosis type 1-like syndrome), neurofibromatosis type 1, Noonan syndrome and Splenomegaly, among others.

Research at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG has led to the development of proteolysis targeting chimeras (PROTACs) comprising a Von Hippel-Lindau E3 ubiquitin ligase (VHL)-binding moiety covalently linked to probable global transcription activator SNF2L2 (SMARCA2; BAF190B; SNF2-α) and/or transcription activator BRG1 (SMARCA4; BAF190A; SNF2-β) targeting moiety through a linker.

A Blacksmith Medicines Inc. patent describes the development of prodrugs of UDP-3-O-(R-3-hydroxymyristoyl)-N-acetylglucosamine deacetylase (LpxC) (bacterial) inhibitors reported to be useful for the treatment of complicated urinary tract infections (UTIs).

Turbinmicin analogues reported to be useful for the treatment of fungal infections have been described in a recent Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) patent.

Cadherin 6 (CDH6) is a transmembrane protein with high expression during embryonic kidney development, with very limited expression in adult tissues but overexpressed in several malignancies such as ovarian or renal cancer, and it is tied disease progression and poor prognosis. This pattern of expression makes it an attractive target for antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) development.