When most people think about diabetes therapy they think of insulin or other pharmaceutical approaches. But new understanding of Type 2 diabetes has inspired one young company to develop a procedure aimed at the underlying digestive causes of the disease. Fractyl Laboratories (Waltham, Massachusetts) has raised a $40 million Series C financing round to support clinical evaluation of its Revita Duodenal Mucosal Resurfacing (DMR) procedure. The fully endoscopic procedure is designed to alter the inner surface of the duodenum and change how the body absorbs and processes sugar.

The FDA has approved a new breast tomosynthesis solution from GE Healthcare (Chalfont, UK) that is designed with a 3-D imaging technology. GE developed SenoClaire in collaboration with Massachusetts General Hospital (Mass General; Boston). The technology uses a low-dose short X-ray sweep around the positioned breast with nine exposures acquired with a step-and-shoot method, removing the potential motion from the tube, helping to reduce blur and increase image sharpness, the company said.

The classic back-to-school assignment for many kids is a report about what they did over summer break. If MetaStat (Montclair, New Jersey) were to do such an assignment, the life science company would have more than enough to report on, from closing on an equity financing, to spinning off its therapeutic assets, and publishing positive results from a study of its MetaSite Breast test.

Medtronic (Minneapolis) reported FDA approval and U.S. launch of its newest cardiac resynchronization therapy-pacemaker, Viva CRT-P, for indicated patients with heart failure or atrioventricular (AV) block.