Tag: biotechnology
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Trial Shows Immunotherapy Reduces Rheumatoid Arthritis
4 June 2015. A clinical trial of an immune system therapy shows one treatment reduces levels of harmful immune activity and joint inflammation in people with rheumatoid arthritis. The early-stage trial led by researchers at University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia is reported yesterday in the journal Science Translational Medicine. Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease, where…
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Spin-Off Biotech Formed for Autoimmune Disorders
2 June 2015. Drug maker Astellas Pharma Inc. in Tokyo and Anokion SA, a biotechnology company in Lausanne, Switzerland, are forming Kanyos Bio Inc., a spin-off enterprise to develop therapy candidates for autoimmune diseases. The deal could bring Kanyos Bio, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, as much as $760 million, as well as an equity investment…
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Antibody Improves Lung Cancer Survival Time in Trial
1 June 2015. A late-stage clinical trial shows an engineered antibody that harnesses the immune system increases the survival time of people with a common form of lung cancer compared to standard chemotherapy. The study of the drug nivolumab, marketed as Opdivo by Bristol-Myers Squibb, was reported yesterday at the annual meeting of American Society…
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Synthetic Spider Silk Developed with Customized Properties
28 May 2015. Materials scientists and engineers developed and produced samples of synthetic spider silk, with a process that can adjust the silk’s properties to meet special demands of users. The team from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University, led by MIT engineering professor Markus Buehler, published its findings earlier this month in the…
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Patent Awarded for Plant Gene Sequence Engineering
27 May 2015. A patent for a genetic sequence derived from soybeans, but applicable through engineering to a range of plants, was granted to Ceres Inc., an agricultural biotechnology company in Thousand Oaks, California. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office granted patent number 9,024,004, Sequence-determined DNA fragments encoding acetohydroxyacid synthase proteins, on 5 May 2015 to…
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Orphan Status Granted Eye Cancer Treatment
21 May 2015. Food and Drug Administration designated an experimental treatment for uveal melanoma, a rare and aggressive form of cancer in the eye, as an orphan drug that qualifies for incentives to expedite its development. Aura Biosciences also revealed results of preclinical tests showing the ability of its lead biologic therapy code-named AU-011 to…
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National Academies to Develop Gene-Editing Guidelines
18 May 2015. National Academy of Sciences and Institute of Medicine plan to write guidelines governing an emerging technology for editing human genomes. The initiative includes an international meeting in the fall to discuss the scientific, ethical, and policy issues associated with the technology known as CRISPR-Cas9. CRISPR, short for clustered, regularly interspaced short palindromic…
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AstraZeneca Building New Biologics Plant
18 May 2015. The pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca plans to build a new facility in Södertälje, Sweden to manufacture biologic medications. The $285 million plant is expected to employ from 150 to 250 workers when it goes into operation in 2019. Södertälje is the site of AstraZeneca’s largest factory for making tablets and capsules, as well…
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Trial Shows Antibody Reduces Days with Migraines
15 May 2015. A clinical trial shows high doses of an engineered antibody reduced the number of days per month that people with a history of migraines experience migraine episodes. First findings from the intermediate-stage trial of the antibody code-named AMG334 by the biotechnology company Amgen were reported at a meeting of the International Headache…
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Sanford-Burnham, Lilly Partnering on Immune Therapies
14 May 2015. Sanford-Burnham Research Institute and Eli Lilly and Company are collaborating on discovering new therapies for immune system disorders using biotechnology tools. Financial and intellectual property aspects of their agreement were not disclosed. The partnership aims to combine Sanford-Burnham’s experience in cell communication pathways with Eli Lilly’s work in biotechnology applied to immunological…