PARIS – A team of medical researchers and engineers from the Gustave Roussy Institute, in Villejuif, France, and Paris-Sud University recently developed an artificial intelligence system called Resolved2, designed to assess prospective cancer drugs. As Loïc Verlingue, lead cancer specialist on the data science team at the Gustave Roussy Institute, explained to BioWorld MedTech, “this AI is intended to predict efficiently whether a cancer treatment molecule will achieve authorization or not within six years of pharmacological data and phase I clinical trials.”
LONDON – Dutch startup Enzyre BV is teaming up with Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. to complete development of a home diagnostic device that aims to make it as easy for hemophiliacs to self-test their coagulation status as it is for diabetics to monitor their blood sugar levels.
LONDON – Scientists in the U.K. are claiming a world first, after successfully reproducing the electrophysiology of biological neurons in silicon chips. It is said that artificial neurons respond to non-linear physiological feedback in real time, in exactly the same way as their biological counterparts. Crucially, in terms of their use in medical implants, the analogue chips have a power consumption 109 times lower than equivalent digital microprocessors, which other attempts to make synthetic neurons have used.
PARIS – Grapheal SAS, of Grenoble, France, is developing a new generation of dressings integrating an embedded electronic biosensor. The Grapheal device consists of monolayer graphene on a polymer layer 0.3 nanometers thick. “This noninvasive embedded device collects data from the wound. The wireless e-health wound monitoring system, or smart patch, remotely reports the status of chronic wounds to the care team,” Vincent Bouchiat, co-founder and CEO at Grapheal, told BioWorld MedTech.
LONDON – Advanced Oncotherapy plc is starting verification and validation of the world’s first linear proton beam accelerator system, which is assembled and ready for testing at the Daresbury particle physics laboratory in Cheshire, U.K.
PARIS – Dentressangle Initiative SAS, of Lyon, France, is in talks to buy a majority stake in Marle International Holding SAS, an orthopedic implant contract manufacturer. The acquisition is said to be worth $880 million, although Dentressangle has not confirmed this amount. “We are looking forward to supporting the management team in achieving its long-term goal for Marle, of offering higher value-added services to its clients and pursuing target acquisitions,” Thierry Coloigner, managing partner for mid and large cap at Dentressangle, told BioWorld MedTech.
LONDON – Long-awaited guidance on how software will be treated under the stricter EU devices regulations brings clarity but also adds to the mountain of preparations needed to comply with the new rules. The vast majority of software products that are treated as class I under the current rules – and therefore self-certified – will be upgraded to class IIa and higher under the Medical Devices Regulation (MDR) coming into effect in May 2020, and the In Vitro Diagnostic Regulation (IVDR), which takes effect May 2022.
PARIS – A French research consortium bringing together the firm Cap Gemini SE, the Traumabase (traumabase.eu) network, the AP-HP group of 39 teaching hospitals in the Paris region, the École Polytechnique, the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), is developing the first AI decision-making tool for managing patients with severe trauma in their first 24 hours.
LONDON – The EU's next large-scale public-private research partnership in health is taking shape and due for launch at the start of 2021, succeeding the current €3.6 billion (US$4 billion) Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 (IMI2).
PARIS – Myriade SAS reported the commercial launch of its Videodrop technology at the second congress of the French Society of Extracellular Vesicles (FSEV) held in October in Nantes. This new nanoscale imaging technique captures all nanoparticles ranging from 30 nm to 10 μm in a droplet of solution (5-10μl volume), without initial data labeling.