• Aphios Corp., of Woburn, Mass., was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,750,709 titled "Method and Apparatus for Isolating Therapeutic Compositions from Source Materials." It covers the process for using supercritical, critical or near-critical fluids with or without cosolvents for the selective and rapid manufacturing of natural medicines.

• Aurora Biosciences Corp., of San Diego, was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,910,287 titled "Low Background Multi-Well Plates with Greater than 864 Wells for Fluorescence Measurements of Biological and Biochemical Samples." It relates to Aurora's plastics technology for low- and high-density assay plates. It also was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,932,474 titled "Target Sequences for Synthetic Molecules." It covers proteomics technology for methods for labeling, cross linking, and purifying proteins.

• Calydon Inc., of Sunnyvale, Calif., was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,871,726 and U.S. Patent No. 5,830,686. The first one claims a modified adenovirus that may be used as a therapeutic to introduce genetic constructs that are toxic to prostate cancer cells, and the second one claims a human prostate-specific transcriptional regulatory sequence.

• Cell Genesys Inc., of Foster City, Calif., was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,904,920 for its GVAX cancer vaccine technology. It covers methods of stimulating an antitumor immune response and methods of suppressing tumor growth following the administration of GVAX.

• Ciphergen Biosystems Inc., of Palo Alto, Calif., was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,894,063 directed to methods of desorbing large and small biomolecules without the need to apply external energy absorbing molecules.

• Cypros Pharmaceutical Corp., of Carlsbad, Calif., was issued a U.S. patent covering the use of its cardioprotective drug, Cordox, to reduce the complications associated with all forms of cardiac bypass surgery.

• Diatide Inc., of Londonderry, N.H., was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,932,189 titled "Cyclic Hexapeptide Somatostatin Analogs." It covers the composition and methods of use of somatostatin analogues the company is developing to target therapeutic and diagnostic agents to tumors.

• Diversa Corp., of San Diego, was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,939,250. It covers the evolution of naturally occurring heterogeneous populations of molecules by generating proteins or enzymes having desired characteristics.

• InKine Pharmaceutical Company Inc., of Blue Bell, Pa., has filed two patent applications for new discoveries in the company's cancer therapy program. The first application describes the composition and uses of a unique thrombospondin receptor, and the second covers compositions and uses of numerous cytotoxic analogs that target the receptor.

• MacroChem Corp., of Lexington, Mass., was issued U.S. Patent No. 5,942,545 for its topical gel product, Topiglan, for treating male erectile dysfunction.