Affymetrix Inc., of Santa Clara, Calif., entered into an EasyAccess Silver agreement with Boehringer Ingelheim, of Ingelheim, Germany. Boehringer Ingelheim will gain access to Affymetrix's standard and custom GeneChip arrays, instrumentation and software to monitor gene expression. Financial terms were not released.

Digene Corp., of Beltsville, Md., reported that results from a six-year prospective study confirmed that persistent infection with high-risk human papillomavirus (HPV) is necessary for the development and continuance of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia III, the immediate precursor of cervical cancer. The study was published in the July 3 issue of The Lancet.

North American Vaccine Inc., of Columbia, Md., will receive a $6 million line of credit from a commercial bank that will be guaranteed by BioChem Pharma Inc., of Laval, Quebec. The line of credit will be used to fund the company's near-term cash requirements.

Protein Design Labs Inc., of Fremont, Calif., and Fujisawa Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd., of Osaka, Japan, entered into an agreement to engineer certain antibodies targeted to the treatment of inflammatory- and immunologically mediated diseases. The engineering will include the use of PDL's patented modification of the constant region of IgG2 antibodies. Financial terms were not disclosed.