Inês Martins, PhD, managing science editor —

AdAlta has issued an initial public offering (IPO) on the Australian Stock Exchange to raise AU $10 million (US $7.5 million), to fund clinical studies for AD-114, the company’s leading compound under development for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and other fibrotic disease. An (IPO) is the first sale of stock by…

A biochemical pathway in the lungs, in which an antioxidant called glutathione (GSH) binds to and changes the nature of specific proteins, may be involved in the development of pulmonary fibrosis, according to researchers at the University of Vermont. The study, “Attenuation of lung fibrosis in mice with a clinically relevant…

Two clinical hallmarks of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), traction bronchiectasis and honeycombing, may be aspects of one continuous process of lung remodeling rather than distinct entities, as previously thought, according to researchers in Italy. Traction bronchiectasis refers to an irreversible dilation of bronchi, and honeycombing to the diffuse pulmonary…

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issued a new patent to iBio, covering the company’s rights for the use of endostatin-related peptides with therapeutic potential in a number of fibrotic diseases, including scleroderma and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). The patent, US 9,365,616, is titled “Use of Endostatin Peptides for the Treatment…

Patient stratification to deliver personalized medicine has become a routine practice in oncology that may be of great help in understanding and managing pulmonary diseases, such as idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). Supported by a deep understanding of a disease,  stratification is a process that categorizes patients into subgroups according to disease progression,…

Doctors rarely see patients with symptoms of both pulmonary fibrosis and emphysema, but those who do quickly learn that these patients chart a very different clinical course than those with either condition. A case study by researchers at  Deccan College of Medical Sciences in India and the University of Florida underscores this, detailing a patient with combined pulmonary fibrosis…

Bellerophon Therapeutics recently announced that the Phase 3 INOvation-1 clinical trial evaluating the safety and efficacy of the INOpulse delivery of nitric oxide (NO) in patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) has enrolled its first patient. In addition, the company is developing two other INOpulse devices, which may be used to treat patients…

Circulating levels of two biomarkers — matrix metalloproteinase-7 (MMP-7) and Krebs von den Lungen-6 (KL-6) — may be effective predictors of disease progression and survival in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), according to the study, “Comparative Study of Circulating MMP-7, CCL18, KL-6, SP-A, and SP-D as Disease…

Auto-immunity may have a role in the development of fibrotic idiopathic interstitial pneumonias (fIIP), a disease once thought to result solely from environmental factors. New research suggests a possible genetic link, associating two variants of the human leukocyte antigen (HLA) allele to an increased risk of fIIP. The study, “Genome-wide…

Patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) often exhibit cardiovascular manifestations that affect patients’ morbidity and mortality according to the study”Cardiac manifestations of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis,” published in Intractable and Rare Diseases Research. The authors reviewed evidence that links cardiovascular diseases to IPF and how the co-morbidities…