Fifteen university research teams from Maryland will receive a total of $4.1 million to work with local companies to turn their research into products that could one day be sold on the commercial market.
The grants were awarded by the Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) program to projects that pair researchers at University System of Maryland schools with local businesses. The $4.1 million is a combination of MIPS grants and matching funding provided by participating companies.
GSK is inviting academic scientists to enter their most innovative drug research proposals into its 2014 Discovery Fast Track Challenge– a program designed to accelerate the translation of early-stage research into game-changing new medicines.
Building on the success of its first program in 2013, which ran in the United States and Canada, GSK is implementing the challenge for a second year and expanding it to include Europe. Scientists who participate in the challenge are asked to submit details about the biological targets or pathways they are researching and the scientific rationale detailing how this early stage research could direct future drug development.
It pays to have a college diploma — and preferably more than one.
A worker who holds a bachelor’s degree will typically earn 77 percent more than a colleague who didn’t go beyond high school, says a new U.S. Census Bureau report. And a person with a master’s degree will earn 17 percent more than an individual with a B.A. or B.S.
Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett today announced that investors in 10 local biotech companies will receive $500,000 in return for investing more than $7 million in local companies that qualified for the County’s local biotech tax credit supplement program. “Again in 2013, our biotech sector will benefit from the County’s local biotech tax credit supplement program,” said Leggett. “It is another indication that our biotech companies are thriving and that Montgomery County supports their ongoing growth and success financially, along with targeted programmatic support.”
The U.S. experiences cycles in liquidity because, well, we just aren’t that creative. In 2006 to 2007 we saw waves of consumer tech IPOs, then the inevitable ebb, followed by the flow of enterprise tech IPOs from 2010 to 2013. But while high profile brands like Twitter and FireEye dominated the news, did you know that 38 healthcare firms went public, compared to 28 in technology? In 2013 we saw healthcare IT investments break records, exceeding $1.9 billion in total investments. And digital health has only scratched the surface: I believe that healthcare IT IPOs will quadruple enterprise tech IPOs this year.
The healthcare IT market is ripe for IPOs for several reasons.
The University of Maryland (UM) BioPark and UM Ventures announced today that Advanced Metrics, a successful early-stage UM, Baltimore (UMB) startup has moved from offices on the University’s campus to the BioPark. Advanced Metrics is leveraging software development and data expertise to provide solutions for the healthcare industry. It has moved quickly into commercialization since establishment only a year ago. Two employees will develop the company’s technologies at the BioPark. The company also has additional staff in Mountville, Pennsylvania.
“Moving to the UM BioPark allows us to grow in an innovation-rich environment, where a variety of scientific companies operate,” said Steven Herr, Ph.D., CEO of Advanced Metrics. “We aspire to be innovative and agile, and to work in a smart way for healthcare practitioners and families. Moving to the BioPark and surrounding ourselves with innovative peers is an ideal step towards accomplishing our
BD Diagnostics, a segment of BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company), a leading global medical technology company, announced today that it received 510(k) clearance and Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) Waiver from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the BD Veritor™ System for Rapid Detection of Group A Strep . This is the first commercially available rapid Group A Strep test system that incorporates a digital result to receive CLIA Waiver. The new assay is cleared for use in hospitals, outpatient clinics and other patient-care settings.
Group A Strep is the most common bacterial cause of pharyngitis. More accurately determining the etiology of pharyngitis can help providers make more appropriate antibiotic treatment decisions.
William G. “Bill” Robertson plans to leave his post as president and chief executive of Gaithersburg-based health system Adventist HealthCare in April to lead MultiCare Health System, a not-for-profit organization based in Washington state.
Robertson has led Adventist — one of the largest private employers in Maryland, with more than 6,200 employees — since 2000. His last day will be April 4, Adventist HealthCare Board of Trustees Chairman David E. Weigley announced Monday.
Twenty-somethings can be a tough crowd to please. They’re glued to their smartphones, opinionated, and entirely dependent on technology. When facing an illness, they’ll jump head-first into the information-abyss of a Google search. By the time they make it to the doctor’s office, they’ve already digested 15 academic studies and 10 online articles.
As the Pew Center points out, this hyper-connected behavior is a double edged sword — on the one hand, millennial patients have the resources to be their most empowered and informed. The problem? These young information-seekers risk falling prey to poorly researched online articles, bad advice on social media, and the impulse to self-medicate to avoid expensive ER visits. Not to mention, some members of this demographic are deluded enough to think that they’re ‘too healthy for healthcare.’
NexImmune, an immunotherapy company developing products for the treatment of cancer, today announced a new scientific publication by NexImmune co-founder Dr. Jonathan Schneck and colleagues that provides an important advance in the use of its proprietary Artificial Immune (AIMä) Technology for cellular therapy of cancer. The study, published this week in ACS Nano, demonstrated the use of nanoparticle artificial Antigen Presenting Cells (aAPC), a key component of the AIM technology, with applied magnetic fields to activate and expand naive, normally poorly responsive T cell populations. Significantly, activated cells were highly effective for treating cancer in a mouse model system.
Activating naive T cells has been a key, but elusive goal of immunotherapy as these cells are more effective than differentiated T cell subtypes for treating cancer. Once activated, naive T cells have a higher proliferative capacity and a greater ability to generate strong, long-term T cell responses important for immunotherapy. Thus, this study describes a novel approach whereby AIM aAPC can potentially be coupled to magnetic-field-enhanced activation of T cells to increase the yield and activity of antigen-specific T cells expanded from naive precursors, thereby improving cellular therapy for cancer.
