A Medical Device Daily

Select Medical (Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania) reported the signing of a definitive agreement to acquire Nexus Health Systems (Houston) for about $49 million in cash, plus the assumption of a capital lease.

The purchase price is subject to adjustment based on Nexus's net working capital, cash and indebtedness on the closing date.

Nexus provides medical services in the residential and medical specialty fields.

The transaction, which is expected to close in 2Q07, is subject to a number of closing conditions, including receipt of regulatory approvals.

Select Medical is an operator of specialty hospitals in the U.S. It operates 90 long-term acute care hospitals in 26 states. It also operates four acute medical rehabilitation hospitals in New Jersey. Select is also an operator of outpatient rehabilitation clinics in the U.S., with about 544 locations.

In other dealmaking news: Millipore (Billerica, Massachusetts) reported a collaboration with Dr. Gerry Shaw from the University of Florida (Gainesville, Florida) and EnCor Biotechnology (Gainesville) to develop and license an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kit. This kit is designed to accurately measure the levels of pNF-H, a sensitive biomarker of axonal injury, in homogenates of tissues as well as samples of serum, CSF and other bodily fluids.

The neurofilament ELISA kit can be used in research not only for detecting the extent of spinal cord and brain injuries, but also finding axonal degeneration in neurological diseases, such as ALS and multiple sclerosis.

The kit measures upregulation of pNF-H in a variety of damage, intoxication and disease states. This assay functions on all mammalian species tested to date, including rat, mouse, rabbit, cat, pig, cow and human.

"We believe collaborations like this will accelerate discovery and therapy in the field of degenerative diseases, and Millipore is committed to further partnering with scientists at leading academic, biotech and government institutions to supply research tools worldwide which will accelerate breakthroughs in medicine and therapies," said Kumar Bala, marketing director for Antibody Technology Bat Millipore.

Shaw, a professor in the department of neuroscience at the McKnight Brain Institute at the University of Florida College of Medicine, founded EnCor Biotechnology in December 1999. EnCor manufactures antibodies and proteins. In December 2004, EnCor, Shaw and a collaborator, Dr. Brian Pike at the National Institutes of Health, reported a patent pending on the ELISA assay.

Millipore's Bioscience provides products for life science research and development.