The FDA gave itself a proverbial pat on the back in its just-released Innovative Drug Approvals for FY 2012 report, which covers the period Oct. 1, 2011 to Sept. 30, 2012. The agency said that it matched its performance in FY 2011 and approved 35 new medicines during the year.

Although Parkinson's disease (PD) is estimated to be the second most common neurodegenerative disorder, very little is known about its underlying cause. That could be about to change as scientists continue to drill down into the molecular machinery implicated in the disease.

Although Parkinson's disease (PD) is estimated to be the second most common neurodegenerative disorder, very little is known about its underlying cause. That could be about to change as scientists continue to drill down into the molecular machinery implicated in the disease. Recent scientific discoveries are beginning to open up the potential for both the development of innovative approaches to early diagnosis and treatment.

Developing a nanoparticle drug that promises to offer an alternative approach to chemotherapy with fewer side effects is a strategy that is attracting increasing interest in oncology circles. Among the many research groups worldwide involved in this field are Canadian researchers who have developed a drug-polymer conjugate that self-assembles into defined nanoparticles and, when injected, selectively accumulate in solid tumors. This promising research has attracted funding in order to set the technology along the road to eventual clinical trials.

The statistics are just plain scary. New estimates released by the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) to mark World Diabetes Day 2012 last week say that 371 million people have diabetes and 187 million diabetes cases remain undiagnosed. The IDF data mean that millions of people are at risk of costly and debilitating diabetes complications, including nerve and kidney disease.

At the beginning of his first term in office U.S. President Barack Obama overturned President George W. Bush's existing executive order that banned federal funding of human embryonic stem cells (hESC) research with the exception of a small number of existing stem cell lines.

In the world of biotech's binary events where a company's stock price can swing wildly in value on the announcement of clinical results, good news always helps swing the needle in the positive direction.

The second part of our article on wound healing further examines the role of regenerative medicine – one of the exciting and promising therapeutic strategies for the treatment of wounds and other related conditions. Those new technologies are designed to push the body into wound-repair mode much faster than the current standards of care.

There is no doubt that the biotechnology industry is truly global and that emerging markets have become extremely important for pharmaceutical companies. That is not surprising considering the fact that countries such as China, Brazil, Russia and India will represent 30 percent of the projected total global pharmaceutical sales of about $1.2 trillion in 2016, up from 20 percent of the total of $955 billion in 2011.