Cortex Pharmaceuticals Inc. and privately held Pier Pharmaceuticals Inc. completed an all-stock merger, adding a Phase II-ready obstructive sleep apnea compound to a pipeline now focused exclusively on brain-controlled sleeping disorders. Rebranding Cortex in the sleep apnea market, which has no pharmaceutical options, could create a biotech with greater value than the sum of its parts. Read More
In the electronic age, "mechanical" is something of a synonym for outdated. But at a recent talk at the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation director, Subra Suresh, gave examples of how studying the mechanical properties of blood cells can lead to new insights into diseases, as well as their treatments. Read More
More than a decade after describing the anti-inflammatory, antithrombotic and neuroprotective effects of activated protein C (APC) in ischemic stroke and six years after forming a company to move that hypothesis toward treatment, ZZ Biotech LLC has advanced its initial compound, 3K3A-APC, into the clinic. Read More
• Infinity Pharmaceuticals Inc., of Cambridge, Mass., closed its underwritten registered public offering of 6.095 million shares of common stock at $14.50; 795,000 of those shares were sold pursuant to the underwriters' exercise of an overallotment option. Gross proceeds were about $88.4 million. Read More
• Soricimed Biopharma Inc., of Toronto, initiated the Phase I trial of its anticancer agent SOR-C13. The multicenter, open-label, dose-escalation study is designed to assess safety and tolerability in patients with advanced cancer tumors, with a weighting on ovarian cancers. Read More
• Arrowhead Research Corp., of Pasadena, Calif., said that it entered into an agreement with Merck & Co. Inc., through a subsidiary, to evaluate a novel therapeutic monoclonal antibody candidate derived from its human-derived peptide targeting and discovery program, which was acquired through the purchase of Alvos Therapeutics in April. Read More
