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Carnegie Mellon Spin-Off Gets Transportation SBIR Funding
A company formed by developers of a smartphone program that tracks real-time bus or light rail locations and seating has received a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant to commercialize the app. Tiramisu Transit LLC, a spin-off company formed by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, received the $102,000 award from the U.S. Department…
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Merck, Ambrx to Partner on Biologics Candidate Development
Ambrx Inc., a biopharmaceutical company in La Jolla, California, will collaborate with the global pharmaceutical maker Merck, to design and develop biologic drug conjugates, antibodies connected to drug payloads that bind with disease cell targets. The deal has a value of up to $303 million for Ambrx. The agreement gives Merck worldwide rights to develop…
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Venture Fund to Invest $442M in Europe, U.S. Start-Ups
The venture capital company Index Ventures, based in London, unveiled a €350 million ($442 million) fund to invest largely in start-up technology companies. The company expects to focus its new investments on European enterprises, but include start-ups in the U.S. and Israel as well. Index Ventures plans to concentrate on seed and early-stage investments in…
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Prescription Warning Label Effectiveness Found Limited
A study by researchers at Michigan State and Kansas State universities has found warning labels on prescription drugs have limited effectiveness due in large part to their inability to get the attention of users. The results of the study appear this week in the online journal PLoS One. The team led by Michigan State packaging…
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Nanotech Method Devised for Capturing Firefly Light
Researchers at Syracuse University in New York and Connecticut College in New London have found a new process using nanotechnology for efficiently harnessing bioluminescence, the natural light emitted by fireflies. The findings of the team led by Syracuse chemistry professor Matthew Maye, which offer the potential for a natural non-fossil fuel light source, appear online…
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MassVentures Starts New $5 Million Early-Stage Fund
MassVentures, Massachusetts’s venture capital agency, unveiled a new $5 million fund for early stage technology companies. The organization had been known, up to yesterday, as the Massachusetts Technology Development Corporation. The new MassVentures financing will be managed through the Massachusetts Emerging Technology Fund of MassDevelopment, a state economic development agency. The Emerging Technology Fund makes…
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Michigan Adds Six Embryonic Stem Cell Lines for Research
University of Michigan in Ann Arbor has added six new human embryonic stem cell lines to the national registry maintained by National Institutes of Health (NIH). The action makes a total of eight lines from the university available for federally-funded research. The university says the stem cells came from couples receiving treatments at Michigan’s Center…
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New Process Speeds Multiple Sclerosis Treatment to Trial
The Myelin Repair Foundation in California says research it has sponsored has moved to clinical trial stage faster than expected due to a model that accelerates the research process. The phase 1 clinical trial, for which enrollment has begun, will test the efficacy of a treatment for multiple sclerosis that repairs myelin through a therapeutic…
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Display Surface Developed from Air-Water Interaction
University researchers in Finland and the U.K., and Nokia Research Center in the U.K., have developed an optical display technology based on the ability of a surface structure to repel water. The findings of the team led by physicist Robin Ras (pictured left) of Aalto University in Finland appear online this week in the journal…
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Patent Awarded for Non-Medicinal Emphysema Treatment
Aeris Therapeutics in Woburn, Massachusetts has received a patent for its lung volume reduction technology to treat emphysema with a polymer-based hydrogel. Patent number 8,198,365 was awarded earlier this week by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to four inventors and assigned to Aeris Therapeutics. Emphysema is a form of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, often triggered…