Unlisted biotech EvoGenix and Mountain View (CA) ally Absalus have formally tied the knot after an 11-month trans-Pacific courtship. [ + ]

Although US biotechs managed to raise a healthy US$6.2 billion in capital in the first quarter of 2005, the tide has turned against IPOs, and mergers and acquisitions and partnering are gaining popularity as alternative financing methods, according to analysis by San Francisco's Burrill & Company. [ + ]

Diagnostic platform developer Medsaic has won the NSW government's inaugural BioFirst commercialisation award, at a ceremony on Monday evening. [ + ]

Feeling lousy? Unlisted Melbourne biotech HatchTech believes it may have just the remedy: a safe, potent ovicide that kills the eggs of the common head louse. [ + ]

A tougher regulatory regime, curbs on drug promotion, financial penalties for companies that break advertising rules, and a register of industry gifts to healthcare professionals have been demanded by British legislators. [ + ]

Melburnians appear to have been living with an unrecognised new species of dolphin, unique to Port Phillip Bay. [ + ]

Sydney blood-cancer therapeutics developer Pacmab is due to present details of its prospective monoclonal antibody therapy for the multiple myeloma to the International Myeloma Conference in Sydney next week. [ + ]

Venture capital fund Start-up Australia Ventures has invested AUD$3 million in junior biotech Caldeon, which is collaborating with the University of Western Australia to optimise osteoporosis drug leads which could reduce bone loss. [ + ]

Psiron (ASX:PSX) has announced that Stephen Jones will assume day-to-day control of the company, taking on the role of executive chairman. Julie Nutting will continue as the company's chief executive with responsibility for five clinical trial and manufacturing milestones for the company's CVA 21 virus by the end of the year. [ + ]

Biogen has withdrawn its 2005 earnings forecast as it can no longer count on revenue from its suspended multiple sclerosis drug Tysabri. [ + ]

A new Brisbane biotech, RepliKun, has been spun out from the Queensland Institute of Medical Research (QIMR), the University of Queensland and the state's health department to commercialise a novel vaccine vector, based on the Kunjin virus replicon -- the self-replicating genetic core of the mosquito-borne virus of Australia's tropics. [ + ]

A molecular geneticist working on cancer at Westmead Hospital's Children's Medical Research Institute (CMRI) has made a chance discovery that throws new light on the mechanisms that immortalise cancer cells. [ + ]

The South Australian branch of the AusBiotech Student Association (ABSA) was launched last night in Adelaide. [ + ]

Four months into an 18-month collaboration with the US-based High Q Foundation, Sydney's Proteome Systems (ASX:PXL) is to bank US$300,000 of a possible US$3 million in milestone payments, having successfully zeroed in on a small number of candidate biomarkers for the inherited neurodegenerative disorder Huntington's disease. [ + ]

Four Queensland-based companies, two Victorian biotechs and the NSW-based arm of an international pharmaceutical firm have received a total of AUD$46 million under the federal government's pharmaceutical partnerships program, known as P3. [ + ]