Bribane diagnostic biotech Panbio has become the first company ever to rate US FDA approval for a West Nile virus (WNV) immunoassay diagnostic kit. [ + ]

NSW’s BioFirst awards have attracted two top overseas researchers to the state, in the first of this year’s appointments for overseas experts. [ + ]

WA biotech EQiTX has been granted a US patent on its Gingerol pain and inflammation compound. [ + ]

Amgen, the world's No. 1 biotechnology company, said it has asked US regulators to approve the sale of its rheumatoid arthritis drug, Enbrel, to treat the skin disorder psoriasis. [ + ]

Complementary medicine giant Mayne Health has been caught out in the warehouse department, with some 650 bottles of TGA-banned and recalled products being accidentally delivered to retailers across Australia. [ + ]

A University of Melbourne research team has overturned 30 years of dogma on how a cell transports calcium, revealing potential insights into cancer and neuro-degenerative diseases.

A schizophrenic mouse model has led the way to identification of a gene potentially predisposing humans to the devastating human mental illness. [ + ]

Evolution doesn't care what happens to the body after reproduction, says Prof Miroslav Radman, so we humans should consider taking out little extra cellular life insurance to ward off cancer in our twilight years. [ + ]

IBM said it has no plans to take its bioIT products direct to the consumer, despite the potential for increased sales numbers. [ + ]

CSIRO Livestock Industries is leafing through vast amounts of historical cattle data to identify if genetics have had any impact on parasite infestation levels over the years. [ + ]

Sandra Webb has resigned as managing director of Amrad to pursue other interests. [ + ]

Comments by genomics pioneer Francis Collins that Australian company Genetic Technologies' patents over non-coding DNA were of "questionable appropriateness" have spurred not so much a rebuttal, but more of a philosophical argument from the company's CEO. [ + ]

The huge trend towards "competitive greed" is having serious consequences for science and innovation internationally, according to eminent British geneticist Sir John Sulston. [ + ]

Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) is blazing a new trail by using pharmacogenetics approaches for post-approval surveillance of new drugs. [ + ]

Within a year of the identification in 1993 of the huntingtin gene, which in mutant form causes the fatal brain disorder Huntington's disease, geneticists devised a test to detect the mutation, and offered it to families with a history of the disease. [ + ]