Derek Lowe's commentary on drug discovery and the pharma industry. An editorially independent blog from the publishers of Science Translational Medicine. All content is Derek’s own, and he does not in any way speak for his employer.
A question that comes up a lot about mRNA vaccines is what happens at the cellular level after you’re injected with one. The mechanism of any such vaccine is to cause cells to produce a viral protein antigen, but which cells actually do this? It’s also understood that mRNA vaccines tend to act as their… Read More
This new article, I have to say, is rather reassuring about the human immune response to the coronavirus. It’s from a large team centered at Rockefeller University in New York, and it examines 87 people who have previously been infected. We’ve seen many studies of antibody titers and the like over time, but this is… Read More
We have some more data on the vaccine front that’s worth looking at. J&J has published a bit more on their trials of their adenovirus-vector candidate, with data on the immunogenicity of the vaccine in patients. They have several cohorts evaluated: a single shot of low dose, single shot of high dose, two shots of… Read More
After yesterday’s post on mRNA vaccines and RNA mechanisms, I wanted to highlight a completely non-coronavirus application that has recently appeared in the literature. It’s from BioNTech, the German company who’s been working with Pfizer on one of the two mRNA coronavirus vaccines, of course, but they have other therapeutic inter… Read More
So now that people (not enough of them!) are getting vaccinated in the US with the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna mRNA vaccines, let’s talk about some more details of what are in those injections and what happens once the shot is given. The workings of an mRNA vaccine touch on a lot of different cellular processes… Read More
Just wanted to put up a quick note – lots of “real life” (and real work) has been kicking in this week, so what started out as an intended light posting schedule has turned into zero. Probably not such a bad thing! But regular blog posting resumes on Monday – there’s plenty of stuff to… Read More
Well, here I am with the first “In the Pipeline” post of 2021, and damn itall, I’m right back to the stuff I was writing about last time. I still expect this year to be the time when we beat back the coronavirus pandemic, and (as a minor side effect for me) to be the… Read More
There’s been a lot of news, so it’s time to survey the vaccine landscape. For this post, I’m only going to cover the big players that are either deep into human trials or have actually been rolling out vaccines to the general population – another post to come will go further down the list. But… Read More
Here’s another one that we make every so often around stately Lowe Manor. When we had it last week, I just had to roast it in the oven – normally I’d put it on the rotisserie on the grill outside, but weather conditions did not allow it. Like many such recipes, this one is all… Read More
Note: I’ve finally added a “Recipes” category, since there are quite a few of them floating around the blog over the years, so if you want to find all the kitchen-synthesis posts in one place, it’s now possible! We just finished off a loaf of this not long ago around here; it’s a recipe that… Read More
