The latest episode of the DDW Highlights Podcast is now available to listen to below. DDW’s Bruno Quinney narrates five key stories of the week to keep DDW subscribers up-to-date on the latest industry updates. In this week's news, AstraZeneca has halted its £200 million research investment in the UK. Elsewhere, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has fast-tracked a gene therapy, CAR-T therapy could be an effective cancer treatment, and the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has updated its thresholds for ultra-rare disease drugs. You can listen below, or find The Drug Discovery World Podcast on Spotify, Google Play and Apple Podcasts.
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From established medicines to rare disease innovation
In the In Conversation With series, a part of the free DDW podcast, DDW speaks with members of the drug discovery industry about their work and how it helps turn science into business. In this episode, Megan Thomas is in conversation with Emma Johnson, CEO of Essential Pharma, about the company’s move into clinical development, with the acquisition of Renaissance Pharma’s immunotherapy asset in development for the treatment of high-risk neuroblastoma in children. You can listen below, or find The Drug Discovery World Podcast on Spotify, Google Play and Apple Podcasts.
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Redefining the future with plant-based therapeutics
In the In Conversation With series, a part of the free DDW podcast, DDW speaks with members of the drug discovery industry about their work and how it helps turn science into business. In this episode, Megan Thomas is in conversation with Joel Stanley, CEO of Ajna Biosciences. We explore the promise and challenges of botanical drugs, focusing on Ajna Biosciences’ approach to developing therapeutics derived from plants such as cannabinoids and psychedelics. Joel reflects on his experience co-founding Charlotte’s Web during the early medical cannabis movement and how that shaped his perspective on botanical drug development. You can listen below, or find The Drug Discovery World Podcast on Spotify, Google Play and Apple Podcasts.
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DDW Highlights: 26 August 2025
The latest episode of the DDW Highlights podcast is now available to listen to below. DDW’s Megan Thomas narrates five key stories of the week to keep DDW subscribers up-to-date on the latest industry updates. The news this week has emphasised the importance of shared knowledge and expertise to the development of new drugs, whether that is through research collaboration agreements or mergers and acquisitions, with a number of new deals across different therapy areas. You can listen below, or find The Drug Discovery World Podcast on Spotify, Google Play and Apple Podcasts.
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Strategies and challenges in therapeutic development and lab practice
This is the latest episode of the free DDW narrated podcast, titled “Strategies and challenges in therapeutic development and lab practice”, which covers three articles written for DDW Volume 24 – Issue 4, Fall 2023. They are called: “The inner workings of antibiotics”, “Targeting advances in immunotherapies”, and “The considerations for building sustainable labs in pharma”. In the first article, Dr Luke Clifton, Instrument Scientist at ISIS Neutron and Muon Source, explains the molecular mechanism behind antibiotics. In the second article, DDW Editor Reece Armstrong speaks to Christian Leisner, Chief Executive Officer of antibody therapeutics’ developer CDR-Life about methods to increase access to antigens and improving immunotherapy treatments. In the third article, DDW Editor Reece Armstrong speaks to Will Fogden, UK Development Manager, Kadans Science Partner, about sustainable efforts in pharma and the considerations industry needs to take into account when developing sustainable buildings.
Here at Drug Discovery World (DDW) we've been publishing articles written by leading experts in the Drug Discovery, Pharmaceutical, and BioPharmaceutical industries for over 20 years.
DDW has grown as a quarterly business review of drug discovery and development, and now we've created this podcast to allow you to listen to our articles on the go.
In our journal and this podcast, we cover topics surrounding: drug discovery; drug development; business; chemistry; enabling technologies; informatics; personalised medicine; screening; therapeutics, and much more.
For the podcast we have selected recent, relevant and popular scientific articles, so that you can listen to all of the best content from Drug Discovery World. We hope you enjoy.
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