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Finance Friday: 25 February 2011
Here are recent angel and venture finance transactions for science- and engineering-based companies, as reported by Xconomy. Biomedical/Life Sciences CardioFocus in Marlborough, Massachusetts. Attrial fibrilliation devices. $13.6 million in equity financing. CalciMedica in San Diego, California. Biotech with experimental psoriasis candidate. $6 million in venture financing. Acetylon Pharmaceuticals, in Boston, Massacusetts. Drugs to treat cancer…
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USDA Tests Climate Change Impact on Arizona Wheat
Scientists at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) research center in Maricopa, Arizona devised a method of testing the potential impact of warming temperature from climate change on the wheat crop in the U.S. southwest. The technology and the results are discussed in the February issue of USDA’s Agricultural Research magazine, and earlier in the…
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Small Business Grant Awarded for Tuberculosis Test
Chembio Diagnostics Inc. in Medford, New York has received a three-year $2.9 million Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to continue development of a simple, rapid, inexpensive, and accurate blood serum test for tuberculosis. The grant funds further development of the test, following an earlier SBIR grant to…
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Georgetown Univ., FDA to Partner on Regulatory Science
Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) in Washington, D.C. and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in Rockville, Maryland signed a new agreement to encourage research and education in the fields of regulation and public health. The memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed today covers regulatory science, ethics, education, and training. The five-year agreement is expected…
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Pharma Companies Developing 460 Orphan Drugs
A report from the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) says there are now 460 medicines for rare or “orphan” diseases in late stages of the pipeline, either in clinical trials or awaiting Food and Drug Administration (FDA) review. The group says this is the largest number of drugs for orphan diseases in development…
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Ultrasound Advances to Bedside for Routine Diagnoses
Clinicians at the Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut report on advances in ultrasound technology that make it a tool used increasingly for specialties outside of radiology. Yale medical school faculty members Christopher Moore and Joshua Copel describe these advances in this week’s issue of the New England Journal of Medicine (paid…
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Nanotech Emergency Water Treatment Technology Devised
Chemistry researchers at McGill University in Montreal, Canada have developed a technology for a cheap, portable, paper-based water treatment system when disasters like floods or earthquakes strike. The team’s findings were published earlier this month in the Journal of Environmental Science and Technology (paid subscription required). The researchers, led by industrial chemistry professor Derek Gray,…
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Canadians, Americans Get Different Drug Info in Web Searches
A research team at University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver, Canada report that Canadians and Americans get much different search results when they look up prescription drug information online. Their findings were published yesterday in the online issue of the Annals of Pharmacotherapy (paid subscription required). The researchers found residents of the United States…
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Michigan Start Up Company Licenses Biodiesel Technology
NextCAT Inc. in Detroit, Michigan says it has licensed biofuel catalyst technology developed at the National Biofuels Energy Lab at Wayne State University, also in Detroit. The company says the technology can help restart the biodiesel industry that has been mostly idle in the United States since 2008, when rising feedstock prices made the production…
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Grad Student Creates, Markets Rural Water Conveyance Device
Cynthia Koenig, a business school graduate student at University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, created a rolling water barrel and started an enterprise to distribute the device in developing countries. Koenig plans to pilot test the device, called the WaterWheel, in India. The WaterWheel is a 20-gallon rolling plastic barrel that provides enough water for…