South Australia's fledgling biotechnology industry has received the first of two shots in the arm with the commissioning of Hydra, a $AUD1.7 million system that is Australia's third-largest supercomputer and the largest of its type. [ + ]

Initial research by a PhD student at the Bioproducts Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) in Melbourne has shown an edible tapeworm vaccine is possible -- for pigs. [ + ]

Xcell has received European regulatory approval for its video-dermatoscope hair analysis expert system, designed to replace the traditional and painful trichographic method. [ + ]

Gene silencing company Benitec has locked in place US and UK patents for the technology which underpins a recent global licensing pact signed by the Brisbane biotech. [ + ]

Former Merck Research Laboratories director of neuropharmacology Dr Mark Varney has joined Adelaide company Bionomics as VP of drug discovery, where he will lead the company's epilepsy and central nervous system drug discovery program. [ + ]

The image analysis group at Australia's national research organisation, CSIRO, claims the nation's unique research history is about to land it a massive export windfall. [ + ]

Melbourne's Alfred Medical Research and Education Precinct (AMREP), locally known as the Baker Biopolis, kicked off last night with its first networking event aimed to bring researchers at AMREP's Baker and Burnet Institutes together with the companies located in the precinct. [ + ]

University of New South Wales researchers have won a major grant for a project described as "cutting-edge in arts and science research".

The controversial sacking of a bio-IT worker by St Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne has forced the hospital to deny it has any current plans to outsource bioinformatics activity. [ + ]

The Woolcock Institute of Medical Research in Sydney and the Hunter Medical Research Institute (HMRI) in Newcastle have joined forces to form what they claim is the largest respiratory and sleep research network in the southern hemisphere. [ + ]

Novogen subsidiary Marshall Edwards' anti-cancer drug phenoxodiol has featured at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in Chicago this week, with Yale researchers presenting data demonstrating that the compound is added to low levels of standard chemotherapy agent cisplatin, the size of human ovarian cancer tumours in animal models by up to 75 per cent. [ + ]

Starpharma has formed an alliance with New Zealand Crown Research Institute company Industrial Research Limited (IRL) to develop carbohydrate functionalised dendrimers, in a five-year collaboration supported to the tune of $AUD5.1 million by the New Zealand government. [ + ]

Nominations are now open for the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering's Clunies Ross award for 2004. [ + ]

Some of Australia's best-known biotechs -- including Biota, Gradipore, Amrad, Proteome Systems, Nanomics, Starpharma and PanVax -- will benefit from the latest round of Australian Research Council linkage grants. [ + ]

As part of the Australian Society for Medical Research's (ASMR) Medical Research Week, the Amgen Medical Researcher Award was presented today to Dr Ricky Johnstone from Melbourne's Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre. [ + ]