Month: July 2015
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University Campus Serving as Internet-of-Things Lab
10 July 2015. Carnegie-Mellon University is turning its campus into a real-time lab to develop a Google-funded platform supporting networks known as the Internet-of-things. Google is providing Carnegie-Mellon, in Pittsburgh, a grant of $500,000 for the project that also involves Cornell, Stanford, and University of Illinois. Internet of things, or IoT, is the term given…
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Oxford, Ludwig Institute Launch Immunotherapy Start-Up
9 July 2015. University of Oxford in the U.K. and Ludwig Cancer Research Institute are forming a spin-off enterprise to commercialize research by an Oxford immunology professor for cancer therapies. Financial details of the partnership to create iOx Therapeutics were not disclosed. The new company is commercializing research from the lab of Oxford immunologist Vincenzo…
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Antibodies Isolated for Chikungunya Virus
9 July 2015. Researchers at Vanderbilt University in Nashville isolated 13 antibodies from a person infected with the chikungunya virus shown to possibly prevent and treat infections in lab mice. The team led by James Crowe, director of Vanderbilt’s Vaccine Center, published its findings yesterday in the journal Cell Host & Microbe. Chikungunya is a disease…
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Patents Awarded to Women Rise, Particularly in Academia
8 July 2015. Patents issued to women are still a minority at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, but their percentages increased over the past 4 decades, notably among recipients at academic institutions. A team of information technology and library science researchers from Indiana University, Simmons College in Boston, University of Washington, and Université de…
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Allergan Acquires Merck Migraine Therapies
8 July 2015. The pharmaceutical company Allergan is licensing therapies for treatment and prevention of migraines being developed by Merck, another pharma company. The agreement is expected to bring Merck $250 million over the next year, as well as undisclosed milestone and royalty payments from Allergan. Migraine is a neurological syndrome causing severe headaches along with…
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Arcadia Bio, Partners to Produce Stress-Tolerant Soybeans
7 July 2015. Arcadia Biosciences, an agricultural biotechnology company, will develop a new variety of soybeans engineered for greater tolerance of environmental stresses, with partners in Brazil and Argentina, two major soybean growers. Financial details of the collaboration between the Davis, California company and Bioceres S.A. in Rosario, Argentina, and Tropical Melhoramento e Genética Ltda,…
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FDA Grants Orphan Status to Brain Cancer Surgery Aid
7 July 2015. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is granting orphan drug status to an engineered peptide that illuminates brain cancer cells making them easier to surgically remove. The treatment, code-named BLZ-100, is made by Blaze Bioscience, a biotechnology company in Seattle. Blaze Bioscience is a spin-off enterprise from Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center,…
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Compression Software for Genomic Analysis Being Designed
6 July 2015. Engineers at University of Illinois in Urbana and Stanford University in California are tackling the problem of massive data files generated by genomic analyses, an emerging issue as precision medicine harnessing genomics takes hold. A team led by engineering faculty Olgica Milenkovic at Illinois and Tsachy Weissman at Stanford is funded by…
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Poll: Parents Consider Vaccines Safe, Beneficial
6 July 2015. A nationwide survey of parents in the U.S. shows the vast majority of parents believe vaccines for children are as safe and beneficial as a year ago, with sizable numbers — from a quarter to a third — saying vaccines’ safety and benefits are increasing. The results were published today by C.S.…
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Science & Enterprise Featured in ACI Blog
3 July 2015. Because of the Independence Day holiday in the U.S., we’re taking today off. Blog posts will resume on Monday, 6 July. We were looking for a suitable way to mark the 5th anniversary of Science & Enterprise — our first post while in stealth mode was 6 July 2010 — but…