Insights
Published analysis.
Pieces drawn from the blood-brain barrier market map. Every figure below is traceable to a record you can retrieve, and where a figure could not be traced it is named rather than removed.
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Terminated does not mean failed
Across 177 industry-sponsored neurodegeneration trials that enrolled participants and then stopped, fewer than half give a reason that says anything about the drug. Under 25 participants it is a quarter. Above 300 it is three-quarters.
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The validated evidence sits in MPS II, not in Alzheimer's
Both transferrin receptor shuttles that hold an approval treat the same lysosomal disease, and one of the two rests on a surrogate biomarker. What that does and does not tell you about neurodegeneration.
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Mechanism evidence quality varies more than stage does
An approved asset can rest on secondary coverage while a Phase 1b/2a asset rests on a regulator label and a peer-reviewed paper. Across 69 in-scope rows, 10 name no retrievable mechanism document at all.
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Erythroid data exist for two transferrin receptor programmes and no others
A regulator label reports anaemia in 24 of 47 patients. A conference presentation reports low single digits. The two are not comparable, and every other programme in the class discloses nothing.
The underlying work
All three pieces are cut from the same market map: 47 in-scope programmes in non-invasive delivery across the blood-brain barrier, anchored in neurodegeneration, with a source log and a gaps file. Data cut 27 July 2026.