Science and Enterprise

Month: March 2011

  • U.K., Indian Spin Offs to Partner on Drug Discovery

    InhibOx Ltd. in Oxford, U.K. and COSMIC Discoveries in Hyderabad, India, signed a partnership to offer drug discovery services combining their computational, medicinal, and synthetic chemistry capabilities. Both companies are spin-off enterprises of academic or research institutions — Oxford University and the Institute of Life Sciences, respectively. InhibOx provides computational drug discovery services, and has…

  • Companies to Develop Renewable Chemistry Demo Facility

    Genomatica, a developer of chemicals from renewable feedstocks, and Tate & Lyle, a provider of ingredients to the food and beverage industries signed an agreement for the demonstration-scale production of Genomatica’s Bio-BDO. The facility will be part of a Tate & Lyle plant in Decatur, Illinois expected to begin fermentations in the second quarter of…

  • Wide Variations in Pain-Killers Prescribed by Family MDs

    Some family physicians are prescribing opioids such as OxyContin at rates many times higher than their peers, according to a study by researchers at St. Michael’s Hospital and the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) in Toronto, Canada. The study, published online in the journal Canadian Family Physician, also showed an association between the number…

  • Solar/Thermal Power Alternative Being Developed for Soldiers

    A new type of personal power pack in development by six universities in the U.K. could reduce the weight troops carry when engaged on the battlefield. The solar and thermoelectric-powered system aims to weigh up to fifty per cent less than conventional chemical battery packs used by British infantry. The two-year project is being developed…

  • National Lab Develops Material for Safe Hydrogen Storage

    Scientists with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California have designed a new composite material that allows hydrogen to be stored safely and at high densities, while still making it easily accessible.

  • Report: Pharma Research Productivity Undercounted

    In a new analysis, pharmaceutical market research company EvaluatePharma in London, U.K. says current methods of measuring productivity of the industry miss a big part of the industry’s output and thus give a misleading picture. The report suggests the pharma industry is in better shape than most observers indicate. EvaluatePharma says most industry watchers count…

  • Finance Friday: 11 March 2011

    Here are recent angel and venture finance transactions for science- and engineering-based companies, as reported by Xconomy, Fierce Biotech, and Venture Capital Reporter. Biomedical/Life Sciences Kite Pharma, a start up biotech in Los Angeles, California developing new cancer vaccine therapies, took in $15 million in Series A venture funding, from TPG Capital and other investors.…

  • U.S. Agencies to Fund Green Technology Start Up Challenge

    The U.S. Commerce Department, with the Departments of Agriculture and Energy, Environmental Protection Agency, and National Science Foundation, opened their $12 million i6 Green Challenge for business incubators that help green technology entrepreneurs get started. This year’s competition is the second round for the i6 Green Challenge that began last year. Commerce’s Economic Development Administration…

  • U.K. Company Licenses Harvard Graphene DNA Technology

    Oxford Nanopore Technologies Ltd. in Oxford, U.K. said today it signed a licensing agreement with Harvard University to commercialize graphene technology from Harvard’s labs for DNA sequencing. The company already has a deal with Harvard’s technology transfer office to develop basic sensing methods through solid-state nanopores. Graphene is a robust, single-atom thick lattice of carbon…

  • Russian, U.S. Scientists Develop Online Agricultural Maps

    A team of researchers from Russia and the U.S. have developed AgroAtlas, an online resource of agricultural and geographic data for Russia and surrounding countries. The publicly available collection, with downloadable tools to analyze the data, is a joint project of Russian universities and institutes, and the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service, with funding from the…