Drug Discovery & Development

The COVID-19 pandemic left most of the world’s population with an immune memory for COVID. A Cleveland-based biotech wants to use that memory to fight cancer. Celloram, a preclinical stage company focusing on therapies for cancer, autoimmune diseases and chronic inflammatory and metabolic disorders, in partnership with Case Western Reserve University and University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center, published preclinical results for a new dendritic cell vaccine in Nature Communications.

The Arlington, Virginia–based nonprofit American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) will launch two Innovator-Curated tracks at its 2026 PharmSci 360 conference, scheduled for October 25–28, 2026, at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, Louisiana. The organization announced that the tracks will explore the current state of scientific research integrity in an AI era alongside emerging drug development technologies.

A new investigational cancer vaccine developed by Merck & Co. and Moderna is customized based on the genome of each patient’s tumor, designed to teach their immune system to recognize the cancer as a foreign body. The companies are investigating the vaccine as a combination treatment with Merck’s Keytruda, a monoclonal antibody that targets the PD-1 receptor on T-cells, breaking a pathway that cancer uses to evade the immune system.

Proteolysis Targeting Chimera (PROTAC) drugs have evolved from a promising concept to a clinically validated modality. In May 2026, the U.S. FDA approved vepdegestrant (Veppanu®), the first PROTAC drug, marking an important milestone for targeted protein degradation and reinforcing the approach across a multitude of disease areas. PROTACs usually consist of three parts: a target-binding warhead, an E3 ligase recruiter, and a connecting linker.

An estimated 69,000 Americans acquired hepatitis C in 2023, roughly double the mid-2010s rate, even though the disease has been curable with an eight- to 12-week course of oral antivirals for more than a decade. AbbVie’s MAVYRET became the first of those antivirals cleared for acute infection in June 2025, with a 96% cure rate in trial. In the EU, the drug, billed as MAVIRET, won extended approval to treat acute hepatitis C virus infections in June 2026. Maviret box.

[Modified based on Adobe Stock image] In 2020, the average phase 3 protocol collected approximately 3.56 million data points. By 2025, that figure had reached about 5.96 million, a five-year increase of 67% and 6.4 times the 2012 average of 929,203, according to collaborative research from the nonprofit industry group TransCelerate BioPharma and the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development.

Medable’s architecture diagram. Image credit: Medable Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development (CSDD) and clinical trial platform company Medable recently announced an analysis estimating that Medable’s Clinical Monitoring Agent could deliver an 82x return on investment for phase 3 trials and 64x for phase 2. Based on expected net present value (eNPV), that equated to roughly $21 million in added financial value for phase 3 and $7.5 million for phase 2. The analysis focused on oncology.

Colorized scanning electron micrograph of an HIV-infected T cell. *Image credit: NIAID/NIH* The FDA has approved ViiV Healthcare’s Tivicay PD (dolutegravir) for treating HIV-1 in pediatric patients weighing at least 2 kg, including eligible newborns, the company and FDA announced. FDA first approved Tivicay in August 2013 for adults and adolescents aged 12 or older weighing at least 40 kg (about 88.2 pounds).

In April, The New York Times proclaimed that a gen-AI-driven company that hawked compounded GLP-1 drugs was potentially on track to have $1.8 billion in 2026 sales. The paper also reported that the company, MEDVi, had generated $401 million in sales in 2025, saying it had been given access to unspecified company financials.

Definium framed DT120’s potential value at $2.8 billion to $7 billion for every 100,000 patients treated, based on assumed annual prices of $28,000 to $70,000. The company notes that “the price of DT120 has not been established.” Source: Definium Therapeutics, May 2026 corporate presentation. New York City–based Definium recently announced positive data from its Phase 3 Voyage trial of DT120, an orally disintegrating 100 µg dose of LSD in adults with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD).