Investors gave newly-listed antibiotics specialist Motif Bio (LON:MTFB) a shot in the arm this week.
Shares soared 32% to 42p as documents confirmed its iclaprim drug will be heading for phase III trials in the US.
The next generation antibiotic targets stubborn strains of bacteria and is “set is set to fill a major market void,” according to broker Northland Capital.
Its development comes amid a growing concern that the world’s line-up of drugs able to overcome stubborn diseases is inadequate.
A recent report by former Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill found that the current arsenal of antibiotics is losing its effectiveness against drug-resistant bacteria, the so-called 'super-bugs'.
The study was commissioned by Prime Minister David Cameron to look at the threat posed by a lack of treatments for infection such as MRSA and E.coli.
Motif boss Graham Lumsden believes he may have the answer in iclaprim while Northland reckons the drug, which has already been tested on 1,000 patients, could achieve more than £650mln a year in sales.
On that basis, the broker reckons Motif is grossly undervalued and has a target price of 89 pence on the shares.
OptiBiotix (LON:OPTI) was another AIM biotech stock in rude health this week.
The firm uses its technology to develop special ingredients to tackle such common modern problems as obesity, cholesterol and diabetes.
This week it told investors that the three new patents filed related to its work developing novel sugars.
These have the potential to act as calorie free sweeteners and modulate trillion microorganisms that live in our gut, mouth, skin - preventing, managing, and treat diseases, it reckons.
Shares have risen 8% since Monday to 38p and have climbed over 90% since the start of the year.
On the subject of year-to-date performance, the FTSE AIM-All Share Index has now climbed 70 points since the beginning of January.
The junior equity gauge could only add a single point this week, reaching 711, but still maintained its upward momentum.
Matt Butlin, analyst at Allenby Capital, reckons there’s plenty of room for further upside on the index given a favourable general election result and higher commodity prices.
Still, it wasn’t all plain sailing on AIM during the shorter trading week.
Shares in Plus 500 saw their value slide again despite telling investors it is working at ‘full speed’ to re-approve all customer accounts.
The forex focussed CFD firm has lost 60% its value in the past ten days after it emerged that client money laundering checking procedures had been inadequate.
It meant the company had to freeze more than half its accounts and today, it revealed it will take about a month to work through the backlog to reprocess the customers.
Plus500 shares were worth close to 800p at the start of the month but currently change hands for 331p apiece.
PeerTV also had a bad week, with shares down 20% to 0.2p as some of its institutional holders dumped their shares in the company.
The firm makes boxes that allow viewers to stream content from the internet directly to home-TV sets.
Elsewhere, newly-listed Stride Gaming (LON:STR) revealed the progress it made as a privately run company as it unveiled a 173% rise in revenues and a move decisively into the black in the first half.
The owner of the Kitty Bingo, Lucky Pants and Jackpot Liner sites reported net gaming revenues of £11.7 million and earnings before tax, depreciation and amortisation of almost £3.6 million during the six months to February 28.
The shares, which listed at 132p earlier this month, are now worth 185 pence, valuing the business at just shy of £100 million.
Meanwhile, marketing and PR firm Porta Communications (LON:PTCM) posted its first ever annual profit as it comfortably outperformed the sector last year.
Its Australian operations starred, while the recent acquisitions have started to bed in, the company revealed. Shares are worth 7.6p.
Camco Clean Energy (LON:CCE) also generated some gains after the firm sold off a tranche of its Californian carbon credit portfolio.
Camco will receive US$1.74 million in cash up-front after securing a deal with an unnamed major multinational company.
Shares have moved 20% higher since Monday and trade at 6 pence each.