A Medical Device Daily

Nerites (Madison, Wisconsin), a company that develops tissue repair products and coatings for medical devices, reported it has completed a $5.7 million Series A round of funding.

Venture Investors (Madison), with participation by Black Mountain Ventures (Foster City, California), led the investment. Previously, Nerites had raised $3 million from private investors.

The company said it will use the funding to refine product development plans, begin product development and expand its business development plan for bringing the first tissue adhesive products on to the market.

“This funding will allow us to focus and accelerate development of applications for a handful of strategically chosen markets that represent tremendous investment opportunities and have a need for our breakthrough tissue adhesive technology,” said Thomas Mozer, PhD, president/CEO of Nerites.

Invitrogen (Carlsbad, California), a provider of life science technologies for research, production and diagnostics, reported it has made a minority investment in Q Therapeutics (Salt Lake City), a biotechnology company pursuing cell therapeutic indications for the central nervous system (CNS). Details of the investment were not disclosed.

Q Therapeutics focuses on CNS diseases and other neurodegenerative diseases where the protective insulating myelin sheath around neurons has been destroyed by disease or injury, resulting in poor signal conduction, as well as neurodegenerative diseases causing neuronal death. Initial disease targets include multiple sclerosis, transverse myelitis and Lou Gehrig’s Disease. The company’s initial approach is to obtain purified populations of differentiated CNS cells, culture and grow them, and inject them into the patient. The cells then recreate the insulation around the neuronal axons, allowing for proper signal conduction and improved neuronal function.