Science spotlight: Amphista’s molecular glues, gene therapy for FTD/ALS and more

ARTICLE | Discovery & Translation

BioCentury’s roundup of translational innovations

By Danielle Golovin, Senior Biopharma Analyst

February 24, 2024 1:14 AM UTC

Amphista Therapeutics Ltd. unveiled a new type of molecular glue degrader that it made more potent by engineering it to bind two domains on the same target protein.  

In Nature, the Amphista team, in collaboration with  University of Dundee and others, described two “intramolecular bivalent glue” degraders that bind to the target BRD4 at two different sites, changing its conformation and allowing an E3 ubiquitin ligase to bind and promote its degradation. The two glues recruit different ligases, DCAF16 and DCAF11…