Salk Scientist Receives Distinguished NIH Award for Transformative Research

LA JOLLA, Calif., Sept. 30, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Dr. Fred Gage, a professor in the Salk Institute Laboratory of Genetics and holder of the Vi and John Adler Chair for Research on Age-Related Neurodegenerative Diseases, has been named a 2011 recipient of the prestigious National...

WuXi PharmaTech Announces Resignation of Board Member Cuong Viet Do

SHANGHAI, Sept. 30, 2011 /PRNewswire-Asia/ --WuXi PharmaTech (Cayman) Inc. (NYSE: WX) today announced that Cuong Viet Do is stepping down from WuXi's board of directors effective immediately.  Mr. Do has been appointed Chief Strategy Officer of Merck and Company, which is a...

Pharmasset impresses with oral HepC treatment

Investors appear bullish about Pharmasset ($VRUS) after the developer showed off some intriguing data on a therapy against Hepatitis C that doesn't require injections like regiments that include Merck's ($MRK) and Vertex's ($VRTX) drugs do. The Street's Adam Feuerstein reported this morning that the liver-damaging virus was at undetectable levels in 10 patients who got a combo of Pharmasset's experimental PSI-7977 and ribavirin--both oral drugs--after four weeks of treatment. Pharmasset's...

FDA Seeks Comment on Streamlined Review of Lower Risk, New Technology, Devices

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Defensive Medicine a Costly and Uniquely American Problem

Physicians estimate the cost of defensive medicine to be between 26 and 34 percent of total annual healthcare costs. At an estimated $2.5 trillion in annual spending, this means $650-850 billion is spent each year on medical orders intended to avoid ...

ViroPharma snags rare disease drug in potential $127M deal

ViroPharma is banking on an anti-oxidant compound to combat a rare neurological disease. The Exton, PA-based company ($VPHM) grabbed a worldwide license to the compound from Intellect Neurosciences and plans to continue its development against Friedreich's Ataxia. Intellect Neurosciences, a tiny developer based in New York, is getting $6.5 million upfront in the deal and the potential to reap $120 million in milestone payments from ViroPharma. The key asset in the pact--a small molecule called...

AstraZeneca flunks Ph2 lung cancer trial with drug from Array BioPharma

Array BioPharma ($ARRY) delivered some bad news this morning about one of its experimental cancer drugs. AstraZeneca--which has licensed Array's the drug, selumetinib--came up short in in a mid-stage study involving certain lung cancer patients with KRAS gene mutations. The 87-patient study showed that non-small cell lung cancer patients on selumetinib, a MEK inhibitor, didn't get a statistically significant survival benefit, the primarily goal of the trial, according to Array. The patients in...

International Study Confirms CNSystems-Technology

GRAZ, Austria, September 30, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The well-established high tech company CNSystems once again attracts international attention with a big mile stone. The Bordeaux University Hospital (France) confirms that the validated CNAP blood pressure wave offers...

Circadian Files IND With FDA for VGX-100 for the Treatment of Cancer Patients With Solid Tumors

MELBOURNE, Australia, Sept. 30, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Circadian Technologies Limited (ASX: CIR, OTCQX:CKDXY) is extremely proud to announce that its 100% owned subsidiary, Vegenics Pty Ltd, has submitted an investigational new drug (IND) application to the U.S. Food and Drug...

Geron taps new CEO amid historic stem cell trial

After its last chief executive hit the road early this year, stem cell-therapy developer Geron ($GERN) has lured former Proteolix CEO John Scarlett to the top job. And the veteran chief executive's appointment gave the developer's stock a much-needed boost after the announcement late yesterday, Reuters reports. Scarlett jumps on board about a year into the Menlo Park, CA-based firm's early-stage clinical trial of an embryonic stem cell therapy for spinal cord injury, GRNOPC1, the start of which...