In today's ACT Brief, we examine how real-world data is being applied across oncology, ophthalmology, and other therapeutic areas to optimize trial design, how AI is reshaping clinical case intake workflows, and enrollment barriers that led Pfizer and BioNTech to halt a COVID-19 vaccine trial.
In this video interview, Krishna Cheriath, vice president and head of clinical research digital data and AI at Thermo Fisher Scientific, explains how AI is being applied to case intake today and why successful adoption depends less on technology than on reimagining workflows and investing in workforce upskilling.
Real-world data is increasingly used to optimize trial design, reduce recruitment burden, and support regulatory decisions, but adoption remains uneven due to challenges around data quality, integration, and internal alignment across functional areas.
In today's ACT Brief, we explore how digital twin technology creates reliable virtual control arms from historical data, what defines an effective clinical trial tech stack in complex studies, and emerging vaccine platforms advancing toward universal influenza protection.
Digital twin technology can reliably simulate standard-of-care treatment outcomes using historical clinical trial data, offering a practical pathway to virtual control arms that reduce recruitment burden and address ethical concerns around placebo designs.
In this Q&A, Cheryl Kole, vice president of solution strategy and commercialization at Almac Clinical Technologies, examines what it takes to build and sustain a clinical trial technology infrastructure that can keep pace with increasingly complex study designs.
In today's ACT Brief, we explore how to decide which trial complexities warrant core technology platforms versus custom configurations, how measuring patient and site experiences early identifies actionable solutions, and Daiichi Sankyo's collaboration with Tempus to improve ADC patient selection through AI.
In part 2 of this three-part series, behavioral science and service design reveal how poor experiences with confusing information, unreliable technology, and inefficient processes drive site disengagement and patient dropout, and how measuring these experiences early enables practical, evidence-based solutions.
In this video interview, Cheryl Kole, vice president of solution strategy and commercialization at Almac Clinical Technologies, offers a framework for thinking about which emerging trial complexities deserve to be built into core technology platforms and which are better managed as bespoke, one-off configurations.
In today's ACT Brief, we explore how user-friendly technology reduces errors and site workarounds, strategic approaches to combining traditional and real-world data collection for vaccine long-term follow-up, and Merck's collaboration with Infinimmune to accelerate antibody discovery using AI.
Vaccine developers can reduce participant burden and extend follow-up timelines by strategically combining traditional site visits with real-world data collection, but the choice depends on follow-up duration, data requirements, and the patient population being studied.
In this video interview, Cheryl Kole, vice president of solution strategy and commercialization at Almac Clinical Technologies, makes the case that intuitive, easy-to-navigate technology directly reduces errors, improves site compliance, and prevents the workarounds that quietly undermine study performance.
In today's ACT Brief, we examine the three converging technology priorities reshaping trial execution in 2026, why sponsors must integrate digital and physical supply chains operationally, and Eli Lilly's multi-billion dollar AI drug discovery collaboration with Insilico.
As clinical trials grow more complex, the technology infrastructure supporting them is under renewed scrutiny. Across data validation, AI adoption, and site-based systems, 2026 is shaping up as a year of implementation rather than experimentation.
In this video interview, Cheryl Kole, vice president of solution strategy and commercialization at Almac Clinical Technologies, discusses why sponsors must integrate their digital and physical supply chains as a single operational flow and how to build the in-house capabilities and partner relationships needed to manage that complexity effectively.
In today's ACT Brief, we examine why eClinical platforms must prioritize user workflows over data flow, how digitizing sample tracking prevents integrity failures in transit, and the FDA's consolidated adverse event monitoring system enabling real-time safety signal detection.
Sample integrity and traceability often fail not because of science but because clinical trials rely on manual processes and fragmented systems that obscure problems until samples are already compromised.
In this video interview, Cheryl Kole, vice president of solution strategy and commercialization at Almac Clinical Technologies, examines why current eClinical technology too often prioritizes data flow over the day-to-day needs of users and what a truly guided workflow experience should look like for busy site teams.
In today's ACT Brief, we examine how game theory principles can improve CRO and vendor selection through ecosystem alignment, why clinical technology platforms must be purpose-built and fully integrated, and how pricing pressures and regulatory changes are reshaping pharmaceutical R&D investment.
In this video interview, Cheryl Kole, vice president of solution strategy and commercialization at Almac Clinical Technologies, explains why an effective tech stack must be purpose built, fully integrated, and designed above all to simplify the execution of clinical research.
Moving beyond vendor evaluation to incentive design in Phase II/III rare and genetic disease trials.
: In today's ACT Brief, we examine how behavioral science applied during trial design and startup can identify recruitment barriers early, the importance of authentic community engagement over traditional outreach, and how large pharmaceutical companies are increasingly investing in rare disease development.
In this video interview, Del Smith, PhD, CEO and co-founder of Acclinate, examines the structural and relational barriers that keep underrepresented communities out of clinical trials and explains how authentic, sustained community engagement differs from traditional recruitment outreach.
In part 1 of this three-part series, behavioral science reveals how slow patient recruitment and enrollment challenges often stem from design and startup decisions made long before recruitment begins, but can be identified and resolved early when they still matter.
In today's ACT Brief, we examine Thermo Fisher's acquisition of Clario to expand clinical trial data infrastructure, how wearable devices and AI are reshaping patient monitoring workflows, and a collaboration between Merck and Quotient using somatic genomics to identify IBD drug targets.
Deal adds endpoint data collection and management platform to Thermo Fisher's clinical research portfolio, with Clario's technology having supported the majority of FDA and EMA novel drug approvals over the past decade.
In this Q&A, Mohammed Saeed, MD, PhD, chief medical officer at Solera Health, explores how wearable devices and continuous remote monitoring are reshaping clinical oversight, from early intervention to AI-driven pattern detection.
In today's ACT Brief, we explore how AI can parse wearable data streams to identify subtle clinical patterns, FDA's four major policy shifts modernizing drug development and approval standards, and ongoing questions about regulatory consistency in rare disease pathways.
In the first months of 2026, the FDA has moved on multiple fronts to modernize how drugs are developed, evaluated, and approved, signaling a broader regulatory shift toward flexibility, mechanism-based evidence, and human-centric science.
In this video interview, Mohammed Saeed, MD, PhD, chief medical officer of Solera Health, explores how AI models capable of analyzing continuous wearable data streams alongside broader patient information could detect subtle warning signs of deterioration that no clinician could identify alone.
