MicroGeneSys Inc. on Thursday announced that a Phase III clinical trial of its HIV/AIDS therapeutic vaccine, gp160, has begun in Sweden. The trial, involving 1,000 HIV-infected patients, will be led by researchers from the Karolinska Institute, the National Bacteriological Laboratory and South Hospital in Stockholm, the Meriden, Conn., company said. Enrollment of patients in Denmark, Norway and Finland is expected as the trial progresses. Prior human clinicals have shown gp160 to be safe for
Hybridon Inc. announced Thursday that it has entered into a research and development collaboration and licensing agreement with Hoffmann-La Roche Inc. and F. Hoffmann-La Roche AG to develop antisense oligonucleotide compounds for the treatment of hepatitis B and C viruses and human papilloma virus. Roche will fund R&D conducted by the private Worcester, Mass., biotech company, commit its own personnel to the project, and make milestone payments according to development benchmarks. In return
Idexx Laboratories Inc. said Thursday that it has completed the acquisition of ETI Corp., the parent company of Environetics Inc., for about 730,000 shares of Idexx common stock (NASDAQ:IDXX). The acquisition was originally announced in early December. Environetics manufactures and markets Colilert, an environmental diagnostic test for bacterial contaminants in drinking water. Idexx stock closed Thursday at $33.75 a share, down 50 cents. (c) 1997 American Health Consultants. All rights
MicroCarb Inc. said Thursday that it has developed a rapid diagnostic test to detect the agent that caused the deaths of two children and 300 cases of severe food poisoning in the Pacific Northwest in recent weeks. The technology could also lead to a treatment for the illness, the Gaithersburg, Md., company said. The patented technology detects the toxin produced by E. coli 015/:H/, which caused the outbreak of food poisoning from hamburgers consumed at Jack-in-the-Box restaurants, the company
BioWorld Staff Report Yet another investigation, this one by Dartmouth College, has cleared Medarex Inc. and the college of charges made in an anonymous letter last August. Medarex has had its share of negative press regarding certain research conducted at Dartmouth Medical School on its behalf. Anonymous materials submitted to Dartmouth of Hanover, N.H., alleged that Dartmouth personnel had engaged in scientific misconduct in biomedical research, improper and improperly managed conflicts of
ImmunoGen Inc.'s stock (NASDAQ:IMGN) fell nearly 24 percent to $7.25 a share in heavy trading on Thursday after Hambrecht & Quist Inc. analyst Wole Fayemi downgraded his rating on the company to a "hold" from a "buy." More than 2.7 million shares changed hands Thursday, compared with average daily volume of 115,200 shares. Fayemi based his reasoning on the fact that the start date of the Cambridge, Mass., company's Phase III clinical trial of its lead product Oncolysin B is "well behind" his
Neoprobe Corp. (NASDAQ:NEOP) announced that it has signed a licensing agreement with the University of California, Los Angeles, for a beta-radiation detection probe used during surgery to locate cancer. The beta-detection technology complements Neoprobe's gamma-detection system for the diagnosis and surgical treatment of cancer. Currently the beta-detection device is being evaluated for the surgical treatment of neurological tumors in clinical studies at UCLA, Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital
Scotgen Ltd. and Vasocor Inc. announced Thursday that they have merged to form a new entity, Scotgen Biopharmaceuticals Inc. (SBP). The private, development-stage company will focus on developing humanized monoclonal antibodies for the diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease, serious infectious disease and cancer. SBP, with headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif. (the home of Vasocor) and a research center in Aberdeen, Scotland (the home of Scotgen) also announced that it has completed a
Alpha Therapeutic Corp. on Thursday described details of its upcoming arbitration with Univax Biologics Inc., originally filed on Jan. 7. Alpha Therapeutic of Los Angeles said it is asking that Univax of Rockville, Md., return nearly $3 million, as well as reimbursement for damages, attorneys' fees and costs associated with Univax's "negligent or intentional misrepresentation." The arbitration concerns a 1990 agreement between the two companies regarding the development of a human polyclonal
Major pharmaceutical companies this week bristled at the suggestion of federal controls for drug prices. A congressional study of price increases for drugs, released Wednesday, was preceded last week by a "preview" press conference held by Sen. David Pryor, D-Ark., who sponsored the report with Sen. William Cohen, R-Maine. "The report adds to the mounting evidence that voluntary price restraints don't work," Pryor said. "The drug industry's track record just doesn't support their so-called
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Carl B. Feldbaum was named president of the new Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO), the fruit of the merger of the Industrial Biotechnology Association (IBA) and the Association of Biotechnology Companies (ABC), the two organizations announced Wednesday. "I am delighted to have been selected to lead the new biotechnology organization," said Feldbaum, flanked by Tom Wiggans, president of the ABC, and Stephen Duzan, president of the IBA. "I sought the position first and
A Canadian subsidiary of Deprenyl Research Ltd., Bone Health Inc., announced Monday that it is completing due dilligence review of clinical studies of an osteroporosis drug candidate. The information was originally expected to be available to warrantholders by Monday. The analysis by Bone Care International Inc. of final data from studies at Creighton University in Omaha, Neb., concerns One- alpha D2. Bone Health intends to seek an increased interest in world rights to the drug, based on a
Companion bills introduced Wednesday in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate would create clear rules for granting biotechnology process patents. Since 1985, when the court ruling in In re: Durden established that biotechnology processes are not non-obvious, companies have had to seek process patents by arguing uniqueness, which involves differentiating a particular process from all others. Although the Durden ruling is notorious, a series of confusing and inconsistent court cases have
In developing non-immunogenic chemotherapy drugs, ImmunoGen Inc. has devised a new way to potentially target those drugs to cancer cells: an antibody humanized through a technique called resurfacing. "Resurfacing leaves the original antibody framework intact by changing only the surface-accessible regions of the antibody to make it appear human," explained Walter Blattler, ImmunoGen's vice president of research. In vitro cell culture tests have shown that the resurfaced mouse antibody linked
Viral Technologies Inc. (VTI), the jointly owned subsidiary of Cel-Sci Corp. and Alpha 1 Biomedicals Inc., has received a European patent on its HGP-30 AIDS vaccine, the companies announced Wednesday. The allowed claims of the patent, which bears the European Patent application No. 87304345.9, cover peptides from the p17 core protein of HIV, including HGP-30, the 30-amino acid peptide that is the key ingredient of the HGP-30 AIDS vaccine. Also covered are claims directed to immunogenic
United Biomedical Inc. of Hauppauge, N.Y., announced late Wednesday that it has filed a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission for an initial public offering of 2.75 million shares of common stock at $11-13 per share. The managing underwriters for the offering are Bear, Stearns & Co., Inc., Nomura Securities International. Inc. and Volpe, Welty & Co. United Biomedical (UBI) intends to use the proceeds for research, preclinical and clinical studies, facility
Prizm Pharmaceuticals Inc., a development-stage company located in San Diego, announced that it has acquired an exclusive license for proprietary melanoma diagnostic technology from the Whittier Institute for Diabetes and Endocrinology at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla, Calif. Whittier's technology covers the isolation, characterization and use of a unique antibody against tumor cell fibroblast growth factor (FGF) receptors and the conjugation of the antibody to saporin, a cell
HemaCare Corp. reported last week an updated analysis of its Phase I/II clinical trial of passive hyperimmune therapy (PHT) for treating AIDS. "The revised data verify the promising nature of the preliminary data, namely that PHT enhances immunity through significant increases in T4 cell levels and shows a strong trend toward increasing survival in patients starting treatment with T4 cells between 50-200/cubic millimeter," said Joshua Levy, medical director of the Sherman Oaks, Calif. company
Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc. has lost an appeal of a patent infringement suit it filed against New Jersey-based Pharmacia LKB Biotechnology Inc. in a case concerning a method of purifying monoclonal antibodies. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the federal circuit affirmed a San Francisco jury verdict that invalidated Bio-Rad's patent. The judgment in favor of Pharmacia had been entered in April after a month-long trial. Bio-Rad filed suit in 1988 against Pharmacia accusing the company, which sells
European Patent Disclosures Published Jan. 7, 13 (EPO), Jan. 7 (WO), Jan. 6 (GB) Hoffmann-La Roche AG Coccidiosis EPO 522 482 Basel, Switzerland vaccines. Immunogenic polypeptide inducing immune response against Eimeria parasites, its DNA sequence, transformed microorganisms, vaccines. Intl. Flower Develop. Pty. Flavonoid EPO 522 880 Collingwood, Australia pathway enzymes Nucleotide sequence encoding a dihydrokaemferol hydroxylating enzyme; transgenic plants carrying and expressing this