Science and Enterprise

Tag: biotechnology

  • Wake Forest, NanoMedica to Partner on Sequencing Technology

    Physicists at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and NanoMedica Inc., a biotechnology company also in Winston-Salem, received a Small Business Innovation Research grant to develop a faster process of drug development. The $700,000 grant from National Institutes of Health is supplemented by a $160,000 award from North Carolina Biotech Center to develop the…

  • Arcadia Biosciences to Develop Heat Tolerant Wheat

    Agricultural technology company Arcadia Biosciences in Davis, California will develop heat-tolerant varieties of wheat under a $3.8 million grant from the U.S. Agency for International Development. The deal also involves  the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), which will share in the rights to the discoveries. Arcadia Biosciences says some 50 million acres of…

  • Q3 Venture Funding Drops, Science Sectors Hit Hard

    Venture capital (VC) funding for U.S. companies dropped sharply in the third quarter of 2012, with the amount of money invested declining by about a third and number of deals down by almost 10 percent compared to 2011. For the year to date, says Dow Jones VentureSource, a financial industry research service, VC funding totaled…

  • Clinical Trial Under Way Testing Stem Cell Heart Treatment

    Cytori Therapeutics, a biotechnology company in San Diego, reports the first patient received treatment in its clinical trial using stem cells derived from body fat to treat severe heart failure. The patient was treated in September at the Minneapolis Heart Institute Foundation in Minneapolis, one of six sites for the trial, and completed a seven-day…

  • Immunotherapy Developer Gains $4.9M in Series B Funds

    Gliknik Inc., a biopharmaceutical company in Baltimore, raised $4.9 million in series B funds, the second series of financing after initial start-up. Baxter Ventures led the funding round, joined by the company’s existing investors. Gliknik is a developer of therapies for patients with cancer and immune disorders that use the power of the immune system…

  • GE Expands Geron Corp. Stem Cell Licensing Deal

    GE Healthcare, a division of General Electric Company, is expanding its licensing agreement with biopharmaceutical company Geron Corp. in Menlo Park, California for stem cell tests used in drug discovery. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. In 2009, Geron agreed to license its human embryonic stem cells technology to GE Healthcare for the…

  • Enrollment Begins for Mesothelioma Vaccine Clinical Trial

    Aduro BioTech Inc. in Berkeley, California enrolled the first patient in a clinical trial of a therapeutic cancer vaccine to treat malignant pleural mesothelioma. The trial will test the safety and immune response of Aduro BioTech’s CRS-207 vaccine combined with chemotherapy on patients recently diagnosed with the disease. The phase 1B trial is expect to…

  • Study to Genetically Alter Algae for Faster Biofuel Output

    Biochemists and engineers at Texas A&M AgriLife Research in College Station are researching the genetic characteristics of algae to produce a type of the organism that can quickly make fuel-grade oil in commercial quantities. The project that includes collaborators from Cornell University and Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research is funded by a $2 million…

  • Drug Discovery Company Lands Venture Funds, Licensing Deal

    Vascular Pharmaceuticals Inc., a drug discovery company in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, secured $16 million in series A funds, the first round of financing after start-up. The company, a developer of drugs to treat complications of diabetes, also signed a licensing agreement for its lead compound with Janssen Biotech, a division of Johnson & Johnson.…

  • Early-Stage Biomedical Accelerator Gains $21M Initial Funding

    BioMotiv, a Cleveland company supporting early-stage medical research for commercial development into therapies, secured $21 million in its first financing round. The funds are being provided by BioMotiv’s founding investors, University Hospitals health care system in northeast Ohio and the Harrington Family of Hudson, Ohio, a supporter of translational biomedical research. The company provides financing…