Biotech Values

[iwfal]

The cancer reproducibility project is trying to reproduce select papers.

Ed Yong's summary of the results so far is worth a read. FWIW.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/01/what-proportion-of-cancer-studies-are-reliable/513485/

My only comment on the paper is that I think the project gives too much of a pass to, for instance the CD-47 replication study which failed because all the animals had some regressions, even those on naked IGg. This is the mouse equivalent of the laughable and dreaded excuse from some shadier biotechs 'the control arm did better than expected but our drug still worked.'

Also, perhaps it is valuable to re-up this post about the reliability of mouse studies: #msg-95441556

And further there are papers about the fact that commercial mabs often turn out to be less reliably specific than expected. Altogether IMO there is reason to be skeptical of any single pre-clinical study. Or even a group of studies if they are all from one lab.

BTW - as some people on this board know, I've been skeptical of TRIL for a while. Too many companies pursuing what is, at best, a weak target IMO. (I started a bear case post over the Xmas break, but felt bad about posting it)