Neill Colledge, the senior portfolio manager and head of research for domestic equities at Queensland Investment Corporation (QIC), has replaced Kathryn Radford as CEO of the AUD$100 million Queensland BioCapital Funds (QBF). [ + ]

Brisbane-based gene therapy company Benitec (ASX:BLT) will continue to defend itself against what it today described as "baseless attacks" on its patent position by US company Nucleonics. [ + ]

The FDA has said it is unclear whether a testosterone patch for boosting sexual desire in women, being developed by Proctor & Gamble, produced meaningful benefit or was safe over the long term. Reviewers were set to ask an advisory panel if more safety studies are needed before approval of the patch, called Intrinsa, which is being developed with Watson Pharmaceuticals. [ + ]

Open innovation -- the concept that ideas and technology have to flow both into and out of companies in order to maximise the development and commercialisation of innovative new products and services -- needs to be embraced by Australian companies both in the biotech sector and other industries, according to visiting academic Prof Hank Chesbrough. [ + ]

The federal government has accepted the recommendations of the Advisory Council on Intellectual Property, maintaining the status quo and continuing to exclude the patenting of plants, animals and the biological processes involved in their generation. [ + ]

If all the venture capital funds targeting the biotech sector get up and running, next year the Australian biotech industry will have access to more early-stage funding than ever before. [ + ]

Big Pharma executives are searching desperately for a way of 'evergreening" the world's most lucrative drugs, the cholesterol-lowering statins, before they run out of patent protection in a few years time. [ + ]

Pfizer, the world's biggest drugmaker, has earmarked AUD$36.4 million over four years for Australian collaborations. [ + ]

Stirling Products (ASX: STI) has reported that preliminary results from the trials of its lead product ST810 (R-salbutamol) in pigs indicate significantly higher potency than expected, with economic viability at the lowest dose tested. [ + ]

Select Vaccines (ASX: SLT) will acquire the remaining 35 per cent of its two subsidiaries Picoral and Hepgenics from the Burnet Institute. [ + ]

Acrux (ASX: ACR) has signed a second distribution agreement with CSL (ASX: CSL), giving CSL the rights to distribute Acrux's Fentanyl MDTS treatment for severe pain. [ + ]

US antiviral therapeutics developer Nucleonics has claimed first blood in its attempt to have the Australian patent office revoke a key RNA interference (RNAi) gene-silencing patent owned jointly by CSIRO and Brisbane gene-therapy company Benitec (ASX:BLT). [ + ]

A study by Macquarie University scientists will investigate antibiotic resistance genes in humans in an effort to combat worldwide death rates due to infectious diseases and reduce the growing burden on our health system by decreasing patients' length of stay.

The awards keep coming for X-ray crystallographer Prof Peter Colman, whose 3D elucidation of the influenza virus's neuraminidase enzyme in the 1980s helped build a firewall against the most dangerous virus on the planet. [ + ]

Dr Ralf Brandt's company VivoPharm has been in profit virtually since it opened for business 15 months ago in Bio Innovation SA's Thebarton biotech breeder precinct in Adelaide, despite a monthly mouse bill that ranges between $15,000 and $25,000. [ + ]