ChemTrak Inc. of Sunnyvale, Calif., said that Jerry Gin has resigned as executive vice president. Gin, a company co- founder, will remain a member of the board of directors and an active adviser to management, the company said. ChemTrak said Gin plans to lead a venture-stage company. He is a co- founder and chief executive officer of Oculex Pharmaceuticals, which is developing novel drug delivery technology to improve treatment of serious eye diseases, ChemTrak said. Mark Skaletsky was named
MedClone Inc. announced last week that it has received a notice of allowance for University of California patent application No. 07/772,434 from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO). Privately held MedClone of Los Angeles is the exclusive worldwide licensee of the patent, which claims a novel diagnostic testing technology for rheumatoid factors (for diagnosing and managing rheumatoid arthritis). (c) 1997 American Health Consultants. All rights reserved.
Published April 14 & 21 (EPO); April 15 (WO); April 14 (GB) Akzo NV Hepatitis C EPO 537 856 Arnhem, Netherlands monoclonals Hybridoma cell line that produces a monoclonal antibody specific for hepatitis C virus core protein epitopes. Alabama, Univ. Res. Fn. Cancer diagnosis WO 93/7297 Birmingham, Ala. by p58 Cancers lacking p58 gene G e.g., neuroblastoma, mammary carcinoma, melanoma G diagnosed by probe complementary to p58 kinase gene. Behringwerke AG Epithelial EPO 537 489, Marburg, Germany
Sphinx Pharmaceuticals Corp. announced that a preliminary analysis of Phase II clinical trials on its topical ointment for treating psoriasis suggested that the drug, called Kynac, does have a beneficial pharmacological effect on psoriatic lesions, but not enough to be considered clinically meaningful. As a result, the Durham, N.C., company is conducting further, separate clinical analyses to determine whether it needs to reformulate the drug, which acts by inhibiting protein kinase C (PKC), or
Biosys announced Thursday a multiyear manufacturing agreement with Ciba-Geigy Corp. to produce a variety of bacteria strains for biopesticides. The pact reaffirms an estimate by Vector Securities International analyst Peter Drake that pegs annual revenues from contract manufacturing at $3 million for the Palo Alto, Calif., company, President Venkat Sohoni told BioWorld. He said the agreement with Ciba to produce bacillus thuringiensis, the active ingredient in the Ciba plant-protection division
Cambridge Biotech Corp. announced that it is licensing its vaccine adjuvant to American Cyanamid Co. Under the agreement, Cyanamid's Lederle-Praxis Biologicals division will have the right to use Cambridge Biotech's Stimulon QS-21 adjuvant in vaccines for treatment or prevention of specific viral and bacterial infections. The vaccine adjuvant boosts the response of the immune system. Cambridge Biotech has received an initial license fee from Cyanamid for its adjuvant, and will receive
WASHINGTON -- Having decided in March that bovine somatotropin (BST) is safe, the FDA's veterinary medicine committee, with its food committee, on Thursday turned its attention to whether milk from cows that have been given the hormone should be labeled. "The agency has stated, 'Whether information is material ... depends not on the abstract worth of the information, but on whether consumers view such information as important," said Lucy Russell, the FDA's assistant chief counsel for foods
Vical Inc. (NASDAQ:VICL) announced late Thursday that it will receive $1.25 million from collaborator Merck & Co. Inc. (NYSE:MRK) to extend its option on vaccines developed against five specific infectious disease targets. Vical agreed to license its gene therapeutics technology, which uses DNA and/or RNA gene sequences derived from a viral genome, to Merck in May 1991 to develop vaccines for human infectious diseases. Merck originally selected two important vaccine targets, human
Cephalon Inc. announced that safety studies of its recombinant insulin-like growth factor Myotrophin in patients with, and without, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis safely achieved concentrations that helped heal motor neurons in preclinical studies. Stanley Appel, chairman of the Department of Neurology at The Baylor College of Medicine, presented the Phase I results at the annual meeting of the International Spinal Muscle Atrophy Consortium. Michael Lewis, Cephalon's senior director of
Any week now, evaluation of the newest test for mankind's oldest disease will begin at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. Until lately, pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) seemed to be on the way out, thanks to a growing arsenal of antibiotics specifically fatal to Mycobacterium tuberculosis. But in recent years, the pathogen has overtaken the drugs ganged up against it, and multidrug resistance is driving the statistics of TB infection and death back up. TB now infects 8 million people
Genta Inc. announced Thursday that it has entered into a collaborative agreement with a French clinical studies organization that could be worth upwards of $10 million to the San Diego company. The Centre de Pharmacologie Clinique et d'Evaluation Therapeutiques (CPCET), which was created by a regional agency of the French government in Marseilles, will conduct clinical trials on up to nine of Genta's products, which the company is developing itself or are part of its joint venture with the
Cortex Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:CORX) announced that it has received a small business innovation research (SBIR) grant from the National Cancer Institute worth up to $600,000 for discovering and developing drugs that interfere with the effects of cancer chemotherapeutics on the peripheral nervous system, such as taxol and vinblastine. "This grant provides additional support for our satellite program in peripheral neuropathy and apoptosis," said Alan Steigrod, president and chief executive
Chiron Corp. tipped the scales of profitability for the first quarter of 1993. The Emeryville, Calif., company (NASDAQ:CHIR) reported a net income of about $2.5 million, or 8 cents per share. The exact amount of the earnings per share (EPS) "exceeded the majority (of analysts') expectations, but they're right on target (for turning a profit)," said Greg Brown, a biotechnology analyst at Vector Securities International. Brown said he had been "looking for a 2-cent loss this quarter." But Eric
WASHINGTON -- Bert Vogelstein of Johns Hopkins University and two other researchers announced on Wednesday the discovery of a new gene that triggers colorectal cancer at a press conference at the American Association for the Advancement of Science here. Because the gene apparently triggers mutations that lead to cancer, it may also be responsible for cancers of the uterus, stomach, ovary, small intestine, gall bladder, kidney and ureter. "This development in three different laboratories, which
Phase III clinical trial results on Genzyme Corp.'s recombinant glucocerebrosidase (r-GCR) for treating Gaucher's disease were reported Tuesday at the American Pediatric Society/The Society for Pediatric Research Meeting in Washington, D.C. The pivotal trial was a double-blind, randomized study comparing the effects of r-GCR with Ceredase (Genzyme's FDA- approved natural version of the enzyme, which is derived from human placenta) in 30 patients with Gaucher's disease over a period of six
Genzyme Corp. announced that its diagnostics division has acquired the business assets of Omnia Res srl to form Genzyme srl, which will remain in Milan Italy. Omnia Res has been the sole distributor of Genzyme immunobiological and research products to the Italian market. The terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Just last week Genzyme (NASDAQ:GENZ) of Cambridge, Mass., acquired a German diagnostics company, Virotech System- Diagnostika GmbH of Russelsheim, for about $10 million. David
Preclinical studies of a class of adenosine regulating agents (ARAs) showed inhibition of cell adhesion molecules involved in accumulation of neutrophils at sites of inflammation, scientists from Gensia Pharmaceuticals Inc. reported Tuesday at the American Society of Clinical Investigators and American Federation for Clinical Research meetings in Washington, D.C. The studies examined inhibitors of adenosine kinase. Two agents, AKI-1 and AKI-2, significantly inhibited neutrophil adhesion to
Phase I safety data on an antisense oligonucleotide for treating genital warts were presented last week at the Sixth International Conference for Antiviral Research in Venice, Italy. The compound, ISIS 2105, is an antisense construct to human papilloma virus, the cause of genital warts, being developed by Isis Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:ISIP) of Carlsbad, Calif. It was the first injectable antisense drug to gain investigational new drug approval from the FDA. In the Phase I trials, ISIS 2105
Pharmakon Research International Inc., a pharmacology, toxicology and pharmacokinetic testing service, introduced Wednesday its first animal model that can be used to screen drugs for treating the glucose intolerance associated with Type II diabetes. The transgenic mouse, called Biodigm-IGT, has been genetically engineered to express elevated levels of insulin, the presence of which makes the mouse hyperinsulinemic and glucose- intolerant. The Biodigm transgenic mouse is proprietary to DNX
Seragen Inc.'s interleukin-2 receptor targeted fusion toxin DAB486IL-2 is able to produce a statistically significant improvement in the clinical symptoms of some rheumatoid arthritis patients, according to the latest results of the company's double-blind Phase II clinical trial. Larry Moreland, director of clinical intervention programs at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, presented the trial results on Sunday at the jointly sponsored Annual Meeting of the Association of American
ChemTrak Inc. of Sunnyvale, Calif., said that Jerry Gin has resigned as executive vice president. Gin, a company co- founder, will remain a member of the board of directors and an active adviser to management, the company said. ChemTrak said Gin plans to lead a venture-stage company. He is a co- founder and chief executive officer of Oculex Pharmaceuticals, which is developing novel drug delivery technology to improve treatment of serious eye diseases, ChemTrak said. Mark Skaletsky was named