Drug Development
Analysts said the outcome is disappointing because there are no approved treatments for dyskinetic cerebral palsy, but the setback had little impact on Neurocrine’s valuation.
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In the midst of regulatory and political upheaval, biopharma’s R&D engine kept running, churning out highs and lows in equal parts. Here are some of this year’s most glorious clinical trial victories.
Every year in biopharma brings its share of grueling defeats, and 2025 was no different, especially for companies targeting neurological diseases. Some failures split up partners, and one particularly egregious case even led to the demise of an entire company.
The R&D pipeline for depression therapies faced a demoralizing 2025 as five high-profile candidates, including KOR antagonists by Johnson & Johnson and Neumora Therapeutics, flunked late-stage clinical trials, underscoring the persistent challenges of CNS drug development.
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In a small Phase IIa trial, Insilico’s generative AI-designed idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis drug improved lung function and was well-tolerated across all dosing groups.
Analysts did not seem very concerned by the treatment-related serious adverse event, noting that NGN-401 was well-tolerated at a lower dose and showed promising efficacy outcomes.
The shocking failure of AbbVie’s emraclidine has investors questioning the Big Pharma’s long-term neuroscience strategy, which put the drug at the center of expectations.
Novavax’s shared jumped 12% in pre-market trading on the news.
In February 2024, the FDA put two Phase II studies of zelnecirnon under a clinical hold after a case of liver failure was deemed potentially related to the drug.
The companies did not provide detailed data for Tezspire, however, and William Blair’s Matt Phipps said in a note he does not expect the antibody to outperform Dupixent.
The past four years have brought disappointment for the Huntington’s community, but optimism is growing as companies including Prilenia and Wave Life Sciences eye paths to approval of therapies that could address the underlying cause of the disease.
A fatal, highly hereditary illness with no disease-modifying treatments, Huntington’s is long overdue for a therapeutic win. Here, BioSpace looks at five candidates that could change the trajectory for patients.
With Eisai and Biogen’s Leqembi and Eli Lilly’s Kisunla launching onto the market, the 2024 Clinical Trials of Alzheimer’s Disease conference focused on the role these drugs might play, as well as combination therapies and innovative new treatment options.
The investigational therapy, vesleteplirsen, had been positioned as an updated version of Sarepta’s original exon 51-skipping Duchenne muscular dystrophy drug Exondys 51.