A conference on the hot topic of RNA interference will be held in
London, UK in October, with the keynote address delivered by
leading RNAi researcher Craig Mello.
Hovione of Portugal has teamed up with drug delivery company CyDex
to develop improved formulations of drugs that have lost or will
soon lose patent protection.
Companies developing new drugs for the global market must deal with
the rising costs of the R&D process - and outsourcing may well
be the best route, according to Dr Faiz Kermani, a specialist in
outsourcing and research development.
Vectura, a UK biotechnology company which is developing an inhaled
alternative to orally acting impotence drugs such as Pfizer's
Viagra (sildenafil), has announced plans to float on the London
stock market.
Scientists in the UK are tipped to be given approval this week to
create cloned human embryos to harvest stem cells to treat diabetes
patients and with the possibility of treating other diseases such
as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
Swiss active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) company Siegfried
believes it has found a shortcut on the path to market for generic
drugs in the European Union, allowing it to launch drugs
immediately after their patents expire.
Neotame, a recently introduced high intensity sweetener developed
by US company NutraSweet, has been approved by the health
authorities in India for use in pharmaceutical preparations.
UK company Laminar Medica has launched a new shipping container for
pharmaceuticals that according to tests does not deviate from the
set temperature range, even after 450 intercontinental
transportations.
India's Jubilant Organosys has bought two companies in Belgium as
part of a drive to improve its presence in the European market for
generic drugs and active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs).
Membrane separation systems dominate the European market for
industrial process water treatment equipment, and the technology
looks set to consolidate and spread to Eastern Europe.
Malvern Instruments of the UK has launched a new system that is
intended as an entry level product for companies needing to size
particles in dry powders, suspensions and emulsions.
A coalition of biopharmaceutical companies and regulatory agencies
has agreed on an electronic data standard that should make it
easier to file product approval dossiers to regulators
electronically, bringing drugs to market more...
The development of an in silico model of the non-obese
diabetic (NOD) mouse, the primary animal model used by researchers
to study type 1 diabetes, is set to enhance understanding of the
disease and radically advance pharmaceutical...
Qiagen and Protedyne have teamed up to develop an ultra
high-throughput sample preparation system for Protedyne's BioCube
systems used for nucleic acid purification,writes Wai Lang
Chu.
Despite a dip in the fortunes of the biotechnology industry,
bioinformatics firm BlueGnome has achieved profit in less than
three years since its formation. The firm's fortunes are in
contrast to similar start up firms within...
A biomechanical pathway which is key to the specific allergic
response suffered by those with asthma has been shown to induce a
specific enzyme which if neutralised, could eliminate the
inflammation and hyperresposiveness of the airway,...
The safety of thiomersal, a preservative that is used in vaccines,
has come under scrutiny once again after a study found that it
causes damage to nerve cells in newborn mice.
The US Food and Drug Administration has suggested removing
essential-use status for metered dose inhalers (MDIs) used to
deliver the asthma drug albuterol (salbutamol) which use
chlorofluorocarbon propellants.
Switzerland's Chemspeed has launched a new workstation that allows
up to six reactions to be carried out in parallel, which should
speed up process R&D.
Scottish biotech firm CXR biosciences and Edinburgh's Roslin
Institute have entered into a collaboration with Geron to develop a
new technique that promises to reduce the need to test drugs on
animals.
Invitrogen subsidiary Protometrix is gearing up to launch a
microarray containing nearly all the 6,200 or so proteins in the
proteome of the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, a commonly
used organism in genomics research.
US-based healthcare conglomerate Cardinal Health has stepped up its
presence in the European market with the appointment of a new
management team for the region based in the UK.
The UK subsidiary of Japan's Yokogawa has introduced a new FT-NIR
(Fourier transform near infrared) analyser that runs as a
stand-alone system, with no need for an attached PC, making it
easier to install in a process environment.
French ingredients company Roquette has been granted a US patent
for a way to make mannitol a suitable carrier excipient - or
pulverulent - for active pharmaceutical ingredients in hard filled
capsules, reports Phil Taylor.
French drug delivery specialist Ethypharm has won a contract to
apply its melt-in-the-mouth Flashtab technology to two new
over-the-counter analgesic products that will be marketed in Japan
by Kowa.
Researchers have isolated a protein that appears to be behind the
curious phenomenon that severe dietary restruction can extend the
lifespan of some organisms. The protein is thought to control
whether a mammal stores fat or sheds...
UK encapsulation specialist BioProgress has signed a license option
deal for a liquid fill technology with the consumer healthcare
division of US drug major Wyeth. If taken to fruition, the
agreement would mark the company's...
This week has seen three companies put forward different solutions
to the topical issue of improving the yield of proteins and nucleic
acids made by biomanufacturing technologies.
Despite advances made in sustained delivery drug delivery
technologies in recent years, a problem still persists in trying to
obtain controlled release of a wide variety of medications that
have only a narrow absorption window in...
3M will no longer manufacture triflic acid and is closing down its
electrochemical fluorination process at the company's Cottage
Grove, site in Illinois, US.
Hospira, the hospital products company spun out of Abbott
Laboratories earlier this year, has acquired a manufacturing
facility that will help it grow its pharmaceutical injectable and
outsourcing business.
The annual US Biotechnology Industry Association event started this
weekend in San Francisco with the usual showcase of new
biopharmaceuticals and other technologies. But aside from supplying
the drugs of the future, the biotechnology...
Drug therapies that focus on the vascular endothelial growth factor
(VEGF) in treating advanced or metastasised cancer represents a
huge slice of drug treatments currently in development. This
molecular target paves the way for...
Quadro has introduced a new powder disperser designed to
incorporate difficult to wet powders into a liquid more
efficiently, cutting the amount of powder required by a third and
dramatically reducing batch times.
Neuro3d has started trials of its orally active phosphodiesterase-4
(PDE4) inhibitor in depression, resurrecting the use of this class
of drug in this indication.
A number of large pharmaceutical and food manufacturers are
piloting a new data logger with radio frequency identification
(RFID) technology that is designed to track and monitor the
conditions a product is kept in.
Novartis generics subsidiary Sandoz has continued its expansion
with the purchase of Canadian generic drugmaker Sabex Holdings for
$565 million (€459m) in cash, bringing in a new range of injectable
products.
Recently formed US company WaferGen has acquired licenses to three
labs-on-a-chip developed at the Technical University of Delft in
the Netherlands that could be on the market in the next two years.
The well established Pharmaceutical Substances database of active
pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), published by Germany's Thieme,
is now available for the first time in an online format.
Fisher Scientific subsidiary Perbio last week opened a new facility
in the UK to manufacture its Hyclone range of cell culture
equipment and mediathat ramps up its liquid production capacity by
a factor of four, reports Phil Taylor.
In the build up to the American Society of Clinical Oncology's
(ASCO) annual conference, drug companies from around the world have
been showcasing potential drug treatments, with a number of new
molecular targets for cancer,...
It has been eight years since Molecular Devices first introduced
its FLIPR (Fluorometric Imaging Plate Reader) onto the market to
answer the need for a detection device that could handle cells.
Drug re-engineering company Eiffel Technologies will add to its
existing project in improving insulin delivery with the start of
clinical trials of an in-house product early next year, writes
Wai Lang Chu.
The Pharmaceutical Services Division (PSD) of US chemicals firm
Solutia is planning a charge into the market for supplying drug
conjugates, which are becoming more and more common in the
treatment of diseases such as cancer.
Researchers have taken a step forward in the development of a
system for making unlimited quantities of antibody-based drugs for
human applications in cattle.
German contract manufacturer Strathmann Biotec has won a contract
to manufacture clinical supplies a new type of cancer treatment in
development at Sweden's Active Biotech.
Human clinical trials involving an Ebola vaccine took a step closer
after Dutch biotechnology firm Crucell announced a single dose of
its Ebola vaccine had successfully protected monkeys during trial
tests.
Canadian company MIV Therapeutics has been awarded a US patent for
a coating technology for medical devices and drug encapsulation
based on hydroxyapatite, one of the major constituents of bone.
Phylonix has been awarded a grant approaching $1 million (€815,000)
by the US National Cancer Institute to develop an assay for
apoptosis using zebrafish suitable for high throughput drug
screening.