• Acrux Ltd., of Melbourne, Australia, expects to receive a $4 million milestone payment from partner, Vivus Inc., of Mountain View, Calif., upon submission and approval of a marketing application of Evamist, a daily skin spray for the prevention of symptoms associated with menopause that recently performed well in a pivotal Phase III study. Vivus expects to file a new drug application in the second half of 2006. Evamist was developed using Acrux's drug delivery technology, and Acrux also would be entitled to royalties.

• AvidBiotics Corp., of South San Francisco, received a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research grant from the National Institute of Health for developing technology against plague-causing bacteria, Versinia pestis. The objective of the grant is to demonstrate the feasibility of using AvidBiotics' technology to build customized antibacterial therapeutics, prophylactics and diagnostics.

• BioE Inc., of St. Paul, Minn., said researchers at the University of Minnesota, using BioE's stem cell isolation technology, derived the company's Multi-Lineage Progenitor Cell from cord blood and differentiated it into lung cells responsible for making surfactant. The researchers believe that is the first time human stem cells from any source have differentiated into Type II alveolar cells, the type of epithelial cells that help stabilize the lung's air sacs during breathing. The results were presented at the International Society for Cellular Therapy's 12th annual meeting in Berlin.

• Borean Pharma A/S, of Aarhus, Denmark, and F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd., of Basel, Switzerland, signed an agreement under which Roche receives exclusive rights to develop and commercialize Trimeric Apo A-I, Borean Pharma's lead candidate to treat atherosclerosis. The drug candidate is a trimerized version of the naturally occurring protein, Apolipoprotein A-I. Borean already has shown that trimerized APO A-I is able to stabilize and inhibit atheromatous plaque formation in mice arteries more effectively than the naturally occurring monomeric form. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

• CancerVax Corp., of Carlsbad, Calif., and Micromet AG, of Munich, Germany, completed their merger, and the change of the combined company's name to Micromet Inc. The combined company's stock began trading on Nasdaq under the ticker "MITI," and closed at $8.98 Monday, up $3.98, or 79.6 percent. The companies agreed to merge early this year to create a firm with a pipeline focused on oncology, autoimmune and inflammatory disease, and technology to create antibody-based product candidates. Under the terms, CancerVax issued stock so that Micromet shareholders now own about 67.5 percent of the combined company, and CancerVax shareholders hold the remaining 32.5 percent. Following completion of the merger and CancerVax's 1-for-3 reverse stock split, the company has about 29.2 million shares outstanding. (See BioWorld Today, Jan. 10, 2006.)

• Ceragenix Pharmaceuticals Inc., of Denver, said in vitro testing has shown that its Ceragenin compound, CSA-13, was more than 100-fold more effective than vancomycin in eradicating a methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus biofilm. The testing was performed by MBEC BioProducts, of Calgary, Alberta. Work on Ceragenix's antimicrobial coating technology is ongoing under a cooperative research and development agreement with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

• ChemGenex Pharmaceuticals Ltd., of Melbourne, Australia, completed a A$15 million (US$11.6 million) capital raising through a share placement, which will be complemented by a share purchase plan (SPP) that will allow existing Australian resident shareholders to participate at the same price. Up to A$5 million is expected to be raised under the SPP, which will price shares at A43 cents each. ChemGenex said the placement was anchored by a A$4 million commitment by existing shareholder, Merck Sante, a subsidiary of Darmstadt, Germany-based Merck KGaA, and A$2 million by major shareholder Charter Pacific Corp. Ltd. Proceeds will be used to fund development of the company's pipeline, with particular emphasis on accelerating the clinical development of its lead product, Ceflatonin.

• CytoGenix Inc., of Houston, entered a cooperative research and development agreement with the USDA Agricultural Research Service to develop synDNA vaccines against existing and emerging strains of the bacteria that causes brucellosis, a disease that causes miscarriages in domestic sheep, goats, cattle, pigs, and in wildlife such as deer, elk and bison. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

• DeCode Genetics Inc., of Reykjavik, Iceland, and its academic colleagues in Iceland, the U.S. and Sweden, discovered a common genetic variant that predisposes to prostate cancer. About 19 percent of men of European ancestry with prostate cancer carry at least one copy of the variant, which confers about a 60 percent increase in the risk of the disease and accounts for about 8 percent of all cases. The variant confers the same increase in risk among African-Americans but is twice as common. A paper is published in the online edition of Nature Genetics and will appear in the journal's June 2006 print edition.

• Hana Biosciences Inc., of South San Francisco, completed its licensing transaction with Inex Pharmaceuticals Corp., of Vancouver, British Columbia, which included an $11.5 million payment in cash and shares. Through the transaction, Hana gained three cancer products, including Marqibo (vincristine sulfate) Liposomes injection, sphingosome encapsulated vinorelbine and sphingosome encapsulated topotecan. Inex also is entitled to receive royalties and up to $30.5 million in shares of Hana common stock upon achieving certain clinical and regulatory milestones. Canaccord Adams acted as the exclusive financial adviser to Hana. (See BioWorld Today, March 20, 2006.)

• ImaRx Therapeutics Inc., of Tucson, Ariz., said it acquired the thrombolytic drug, Abbokinase, which is a trade name for urokinase, an enzyme produced by the kidneys to dissolve blood clots. Abbokinase is approved for the lysis of acute massive pulmonary embolism and had been commercialized for more than 20 years and distributed by three major drug wholesalers through group purchasing organizations. The acquisition is intended to complement ImaRx's development programs, which include recombinant urokinase and recombinant pro-urokinase, both of which have finished Phase III trials. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

• Introgen Therapeutics Inc., of Austin, Texas, said its Advexin p53 therapy was used to treat a patient with Li-Fraumeni syndrome, an inherited genetic disorder that increases the risk of developing several types of cancer, on a compassionate-use basis under a protocol authorized by the FDA. Based upon the clinical findings, Introgen will make Advexin p53 therapy available to qualified Li-Fraumeni syndrome patients with tumors refractory to standard treatment.

• Isogenica Ltd., of Cambridge, UK, and GE Healthcare entered a research collaboration for the discovery of novel in vivo diagnostic and medical imaging compounds. Isogenica will use its CIS display technology to select peptide ligands to two undisclosed disease targets to be identified by GE Healthcare, which will then have an option to advance any imaging agent that results into clinical development. A steering committee consisting of representatives from each company will supervise the collaboration.

• Kamada Ltd., of Rehovot, Israel, signed a memorandum of understanding with an undisclosed European pharmaceuticals company for a collaboration to initially focus on a feasibility test for the manufacturing of the infusion administered alpha-1-proteinase inhibitor (API) from the European company's raw materials, using Kamada's manufacturing process. API, used to treat congenital emphysema, is produced by Kamada using the fourth fraction of human plasma. Under the terms, Kamada would grant the European company a limited-time option to buy a license for the production, registration and distribution of the product following its approval in Europe. Financial terms were not disclosed.

• Omrix Biopharmaceuticals Inc., of New York, said underwriters exercised an overallotment option to purchase an additional 515,625 shares of its common stock in connection with its initial public offering that priced on April 20. Including the overallotment shares, the offering will total about 3.9 million shares at $10 each, resulting in expected net proceeds of about $35 million. (See BioWorld Today, April 24, 2006.)

• Protagen AG, of Dortmund, Germany, said the MIG AG Funds 1 and 3 in Munich are investing in the company, in cooperation with co-investor S-Venture Capital Dortmund GmbH, a total of €3.3 million (US$4.2 million). Protagen has switched from a fee-for-service company to a product company by introducing protein biochip products for developing monoclonal antibodies, it said.