Spirits were high at the 2023 annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology (ASH), buoyed by the U.S. FDA approval of the first two gene therapies for sickle cell disease (SCD) the day before the conference kicked off in San Diego. The addition of gene therapy to the therapeutic arsenal for SCD is “phenomenal,” Adetola Kassim, director of the Adult Sickle Cell Disease Program and professor of medicine at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, told BioWorld. Nevertheless, at a Saturday, Dec. 9, session titled, “Improving Outcomes for Individuals with Sickle Cell Disease: Are We Moving the Needle?,” which Kassim chaired, the answer remained “maybe.”
Korro Bio Inc. has nominated its first development candidate, KRRO-110, for the potential treatment of α1-antitrypsin deficiency. KRRO-110 is a proprietary RNA editing oligonucleotide delivered to liver cells using clinically validated LNP technology licensed from Genevant.
Spirits were high at the 2023 Annual Meeting of the American Society of Hematology (ASH), buoyed by U.S. FDA approval of the first two gene therapies for sickle cell disease (SCD) the day before the conference kicked off in San Diego.
The misassembly of transthyretin (TTR) into toxic amyloid aggregates leads to a variety of degenerative disorders known as TTR amyloidosis (ATTR). Researchers from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and collaborators recently reported on the design and preclinical characterization of PITB, a TTR-selective kinetic stabilizer with potential for the treatment of ATTR.
Launching a company based on knowledge that “the fundamental principle that most people hold to be true is off by a trillion” is a rare opportunity, said Jake Rubens, co-founder and president of Quotient Therapeutics Inc., a company that emerged from stealth this week, backed by two years of platform development and a $50 million investment from Flagship Pioneering.
Researchers from The Brigham and Women's Hospital presented data from a study that aimed to evaluate the role of somatic variants in drug-resistant mesial temporal lobe epilepsy (MTLE). High-coverage whole-exome sequencing was conducted using DNA samples derived from the hippocampus and paired brain tissue and/or blood samples.
CAMK2B encodes calcium/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase type II subunit β, a kinase expressed in the brain that has an important role in synaptic plasticity. Genetic variations are associated with neurodevelopmental disorders.
Inborn errors of immunity comprise a group of several diseases, the most severe of which are immunodeficiency disorders. The latter are characterized by defective T-cell functioning leading to impaired immunity.
Researchers from the University of Lausanne and affiliated organizations recently presented data from a study that aimed to identify novel candidate causative genes of visual impairment.
Researchers from the University of Michigan and affiliated organizations presented data from a study that identified a link between a new neurodevelopmental disorder and biallelic variants in the EPB41L3 gene, which encodes band 4.1-like protein 3 that plays important roles in neuronal development, myelination and cytoskeletal organization.