¿ Advanced Tissue Sciences Inc. (ATS), of La Jolla, Calif., said a federal securities class action filed against the company and two of its officers last year was voluntarily dismissed by the lead plaintiff¿s counsel, with no payment made by ATS. Voluntary dismissal terminates the action.

¿ Amylin Pharmaceuticals Inc., of San Diego, said it signed a definitive agreement with Magellan Laboratories Inc., of Research Triangle Park, N.C., for the sale of Amylin¿s Cabrillo Laboratories division. Amylin received $2.1 million in cash and a $500,000 credit toward future laboratory services.

¿ CuraGen Corp., of New Haven, Conn., agreed to a product discovery and pharmacogenomics agreement with COR Therapeutics Inc., of South San Francisco, under which CuraGen will apply its technologies and expertise to identify new drug targets and develop cardiovascular drugs. CuraGen retains rights to protein therapeutics. COR gets rights to small molecules and inhibitor antibody therapeutics coming from the collaboration. The deal is worth $2.6 million to CuraGen for the initial 18-month term, as well as milestone and royalty considerations.

¿ Dendreon Corp., of Seattle, and Kirin Brewery Co. Ltd., of Tokyo, established a research and license agreement under which Kirin will provide financial support for Dendreon¿s development of dendritic cell cancer therapies. Dendreon will keep U.S. rights and will be a joint marketing partner in Europe, while Kirin gets rights in Asia and Oceania. Dendreon is completing Phase II trials of dendritic cell immunotherapy in oncology indications.

¿ Zen-Bio Inc., of Research Triangle Park, N.C., and SmithKline Beecham plc, of London, agreed to collaborate on the discovery of therapeutics and targets by applying proteomics to human cultured adipocytes. Zen-Bio will receive research funding and milestone payments for use of its proprietary techniques and adipose tissue database.