A group of heavyweight biotech industry executives, including the former CEO of pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc., have formed a new Baltimore biotech company.
Centrexion Corp. has raised a total of $23.4 million since its incorporation in February, according to recent Form D filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
In the same way that great advances in our understanding of the human genome sparked new opportunities for biotech companies in the early 2000s, growing knowledge about how microbes in the human body affect health has paved the way for a small class of biotech startups emerging now.
These companies are looking at ways to restore balance to populations of bacteria in and on the body that, when they become disrupted, may promote disease. Although these relationships are still not completely understood, researchers have been studying potential links between the microbiome and metabolic diseases, inflammation and a host of other conditions.
The goals of this initiative are to: 1) develop strategies and methodologies for the sequencing, mapping and genomic analyzing of established phenotypes of selectively bred animal models with addiction traits, and 2) identify, from new or existing selectively bred animal models, genetic variants with implications for addiction related traits.
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) is interested in funding a diverse set of projects that develop, test and evaluate various simulation approaches for the purpose of improving the safe delivery of health care. Simulation in health care serves multiple purposes. As a training technique, it exposes individuals and teams to realistic clinical challenges through the use of mannequins, task trainers, virtual reality, standardized patients or other forms, and allows participants to experience in real-time the consequences of their decisions and actions. The principal advantage of simulation is that it provides a safe environment for health care practitioners to acquire valuable experience without putting patients at risk. Simulation also can be used as a test-bed to improve clinical processes and to identify failure modes or other areas of concern in new procedures and technologies that might otherwise be unanticipated and serve as threats to patient safety. Yet another application of simulation focuses on the establishment of valid and reliable measures of clinical performance competency and their potential use for credentialing and certification purposes. Applications that address a variety of simulation techniques, clinical settings, provider groups, priority populations, patient conditions, and threats to safety are welcomed.
There’s a reason why Johns Hopkins University has been named one of the top med schools worldwide and the number one hospital in the U.S. Students at Johns Hopkins are driven and relentless in their pursuit of innovative solutions to every day problems. They tend to be incredibly talented, skilled in their respective fields. Which would explain why the Baltimore school was named one of the top 10 universities with the most creative students by ViewsOnYou this year.
A London-based startup, ViewsOnYou is known for acting as a dating site of sorts for prospective employees and companies hiring. It sets up profiles to help match job seekers with the ideal businesses for them according to their personality type. Taking three components into consideration – energy, interpersonal and intelligence – ViewsOnYou offers a more in-depth connection for both parties.
Every year, Silicon Valley creates new buzzwords to make its startup founders, corporate spokespeople, and “thought leaders” feel like they’re doing something important.
According to linguists, jargon proliferates in Silicon Valley’s tech scene faster than almost anywhere else.
I am a biotech VC, but not a techie. So I don’t follow stem cells, gene therapy, and other similar “blockbuster” technologies in the life sciences. Rather than looking at all the gosh-and-golly stuff going into the biotech pipeline, I wait to see what is coming out of the other end. So far, very little in the most innovative areas.
People are excited about biotech’s IPO window and money flowing into venture funds as reflected in, for example, Bruce Booth’s blog posts. But what he sees as a new day in biotech, I see as the same fundamentals in a new synthetic financial environment manufactured by Ben Bernanke. I applaud Bruce’s optimism. Without people like him and the enthusiasm they bring to the space, biotech would be afflicted by the same anxieties that are paralyzing pharma today.
MedImmune’s Cambridge UK medical technology hothouse will be part of an historic tie-up between the business and the Brazilian government’s ‘Science Without Borders’ programme.
MedImmune, the global biologics research and development arm of AstraZeneca, says that 30 Brazilian post-doctoral fellows will work at its sites in Maryland, California and Cambridge, UK for a period of two years.
