Hafnium nanoparticles that home onto microfractures in bone make the tiny cracks visible in spectral or color computed tomography (CT) imaging. Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the University of Maryland created the nanotechnology to work in conjunction with spectral molecular imaging developed by New Zealand-based MARS Bioimaging Ltd. (MBI). The research appeared in Advanced Functional Materials.

The case of Arthrex v. Smith & Nephew, Inc., has raised a host of questions about the appointment of judges to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), and witnesses at a congressional hearing said a Supreme Court review might be two years in coming. Any such resolution might not clear out the thicket of underlying legal questions, however, and thus the witnesses urged Congress to take action quickly even as the Federal Circuit considers an en banc hearing of the matter.

Stephen Hahn, of the MD Anderson Cancer Center, generally managed to avoid any controversy in today’s Senate confirmation hearing for the FDA commissioner’s job, stating for instance that he is “open to all science and data that could potentially support” drug reimportation as a solution to the drug pricing problem.

A team led by researchers at Washington State University (WSU) has developed a nanoparticle technology to deliver cell-killing drugs to shut down the overactive immune response that can cause damage or death in diseases like stroke and sepsis without affecting other cell types or compromising the immune system.

There are a pair of approved CAR T drugs, Yescarta (axicabtagene ciloleucel) from Gilead Sciences Inc. and Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel) from Novartis AG, that have been available since 2017 for a few hematological cancers including some lymphomas and leukemias. But little is known about how these engineered chimeric antigen receptor T cells that both target CD19, an antigen prevalent in the cells of many B-cell malignancies, move through the body and proliferate after they are first removed, altered, expanded in number and, finally, returned to a patient's body.

About two months ahead of the priority review action date, Novartis AG scored FDA clearance for Adakveo (crizanlizumab), previously known as SEG-101, to reduce the frequency of vaso-occlusive crises (VOCs), or pain crises, in adult and pediatric patients ages 16 and older with sickle cell disease (SCD).

Adults with complicated urinary tract infections (cUTIs) and limited or no alternative treatment options could soon receive Shionogi & Co. Ltd.'s cefiderocol following FDA approval for the antibacterial. The approved indication also included kidney infections caused by susceptible gram-negative microorganisms. The new therapy, to be marketed as Fetroja, is expected to be available in early 2020.

BEIJING – Beijing-based Chinese biotech giant Beigene Ltd. said Brukinsa (zanubrutinib) won accelerated FDA approval to treat adults with mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) who received at least one prior therapy. This is the first China-discovered innovative cancer drug to win FDA clearance.

Hand-held diagnostics don't come cheaply, and their applications remain somewhat limited. Abbott Laboratories' Istat portable clinical analyzer, for example, retails at about $15,000, with each individual cartridge costing hundreds of dollars apiece to measure each of roughly a few dozen blood gas, electrolyte, chemistry and hematology levels in few minutes from two to three drops of whole blood.