Month: July 2014
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Arcadia Awarded U.S. Patent for Longer Shelf-Life Tomato
17 July 2014. Arcadia Biosciences, an agricultural biotechnology company in Davis, California received a patent for its engineered tomato that ripens slower after harvesting. Patent number 8,772,606, “Non-transgenic tomato varieties having increased shelf life post-harvest,” was awarded by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on 8 July to two inventors and assigned to Arcadia Biosciences.…
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Food Safety Test Systems Company Raises $60 Million in IPO
17 July 2014. Roka Bioscience Inc., a developer of molecular-level food safety tests in Warren, New Jersey, issued 5 million shares in its initial public offering (IPO) yesterday. The company priced the shares at $12.00, raising $60 million. Roka Bioscience will trade on the Nasdaq exchange under the symbol ROKA. The company develops tests for…
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Immunocore, Lilly Collaborate on T-Cell Cancer Therapies
16 July 2014. Drug maker Eli Lilly and Company in Indianapolis and Immunocore Ltd., a biotechnology company in Oxford, U.K. are jointly discovering new cancer therapies based on T-cells in the body’s immune system. The deal will pay Immunocore $15 million for each new therapy identified, with additional payments of $10 million for each therapy…
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Geisinger, Indivumed Partner on Personalized Cancer Therapy
15 July 2014. Geisinger Health System that serves central and eastern Pennsylvania is partnering with Indivumed GmbH, a biotech company and biobank in Hamburg, Germany to provide individualized cancer diagnostics for Geisinger clients. Financial details of the deal first announced in May 2013, but formalized this week, were not disclosed. Indivumed maintains a biorepository of…
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Novartis Licensing Smart Lens Technology from Google
15 July 2014. The Alcon division of pharmaceutical company Novartis is licensing the rights to Google’s so-called smart lens technology for medical applications involving the eyes. Financial terms of the licensing agreement between Alcon that develops vision care products for Novartis and Google[x], part of the company’s research labs, were not disclosed. Google[x] announced in…
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Foam/Wax Material Adapted for Shape-Changing Robotics
14 July 2014. Engineers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology developed a process for combining foam and wax materials into components that allow robot devices to become pliable for changing their shape, yet return to a rigid state when needed to do their tasks. The team from the lab of mechanical engineering professor Anette Hosoi, with…
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Chip Device Developed to Quickly Test for Type 1 Diabetes
14 July 2014. Medical researchers at Stanford University in California invented a small, handheld microchip that more quickly and easily tests for type 1 diabetes than current methods. The team led by Stanford pediatric endocrinologist Brian Feldman published its results online yesterday in the journal Nature Medicine (paid subscription required). They are also starting a…
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Text Messages Help Young Adults Reduce Binge Drinking
11 July 2014. Medical researchers at University of Pittsburgh show mobile phone text messages can provide feedback to young adults with a history of alcohol abuse that cuts their binge drinking. Findings from the team led by emergency medicine professor Brian Suffoletto were published online earlier this week in the journal Annals of Emergency Medicine.…
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Dengue Vaccine Shown to Cut Infections, Hospitalizations
11 July 2014. A large-scale clinical trial of a vaccine by the pharmaceutical company Sanofi shows the vaccine prevents symptomatic dengue cases by more than half, with severe forms and hospitalizations from the disease reduced even further. Findings from the study, conducted among more than 10,000 children in five Asian countries, are reported online today…
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Baxter Acquires Sickle-Cell Prevention Drug Developer
10 July 2014. Baxter International in Deerfield, Illinois is acquiring AesRx LLC, a biopharmaceutical company in Newton, Massachusetts developing drugs for sickle-cell and other rare diseases. Baxter is making an initial payment to AesRx, which will be eligible for future payments tied to development and commercial milestones, but dollar amounts were not disclosed. Sickle cell…