QrxPharma receives venture funding for pain drugs
11 December, 2002 by Pete YoungA young Australian biotech developing anti-pain and blood-clotting drugs, QRxPharma, has successfully completed a $US5 million financing round conducted by a group of Australian and US venture funds.
Panbio CEO to head Peptech board
11 December, 2002 by Graeme O'NeillSydney biotechnology company Peptech announced today it had appointed Mel Bridges, CEO of Panbio, as chairman of its board.
Biotech projects share the wealth in latest CRC round
11 December, 2002 by Pete YoungA cluster of biotech-intensive entities have been created in the latest round of Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) grants, including a $17.5 million Australian biosecurity centre and a $28 million sugar industry innovation centre.
Patients and patents for Sirtex in Europe
10 December, 2002 by Melissa TrudingerSirtex Medical has treated its first European patient, suffering from advanced secondary liver cancer, with its SIR-Spheres cancer treatment at the Leicester General Hospital, the principal teaching hospital at the University of Leicester in the UK.
Asset sale clears the way for Benitec
10 December, 2002 by Pete YoungGene silencing technology specialist Benitec is tidying up a corporate structure whose complexity led the company to miss an ASX reporting deadline in October.
Chemists told to get proactive about biotech drugs
09 December, 2002 by Melissa TrudingerPharmacists have the opportunity to take on a greater role in patient education and management as the number of biotechnology-derived drugs entering the market increases, but they need to be proactive about it, Dr Ines Krass of the University of Sydney's Faculty of Pharmacy told at the annual meeting of the Australasian Pharmaceutical Science Association today.
New patent approval imminent: Peptech
06 December, 2002 by Graeme O'NeillSydney-based company Peptech has flagged the imminent approval of another of its anti-TNF antibody patents by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
Get close to the FDA, Australian companies told
06 December, 2002 by Melissa TrudingerAustralian companies should start talking to the US Food and Drug Administration as early as possible, according to Kendle International's VP of regulatory affairs, Dr Richard Schwen.
Raise your glasses to biotech
05 December, 2002 by Graeme O'NeillThe future is hammering on the ancient oak doors of two of the world's oldest biotechnology industries, beer and winemaking, both citadels of tradition and conservatism. In Australia, the wine industry is wide awake, and cautiously surveying the landscape for longer-term opportunities emerging from gene technology. The Australian wine industry, which has transformed itself during the past 30 years with a slew of innovations in viticulture, and new winemaking technologies, is enjoying the first fruits of the gene technology revolution -- but is in no hurry to grow GM vines.
Beating the bugs
04 December, 2002 by Melissa TrudingerThere is a complex and ongoing battle between humans and insect pests, according to Dr Phil Batterham, a researcher in the University of Melbourne's Department of Genetics and the deputy director and program leader at the ARC-funded Centre for Environmental Stress and Adaptation Research. Many chemical and biological weapons have been devised to control and prevent insects from attacking crops, but insects are highly adaptive and sooner or later they evolve their way around every weapon that is used against them.
Natural products targeted for potential drugs
04 December, 2002 by Melissa TrudingerNatural products provide a validated basis for protein-drug interactions that should be exploited as a tool for rational drug design, Griffith University's Prof Ron Quinn told delegates at the Australian Health and Medical Research Congress last week.
Bionomics hails new class of epilepsy drug
03 December, 2002 by Graeme O'NeillAn Australian research study published this week in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science explains why current drugs don't work on a common, inherited form of epilepsy -- and points the way to a new class of epilepsy therapeutics.
Taking Australian biotechnology to the world
03 December, 2002 by Iain ScottAustralian Biotechnology News and Factiva, a Dow Jones and Reuters Company, concluded an agreement this week that will see ABN's content distributed globally to over 1.5 million desktops.
Shareholder contact pays off for Meditech
03 December, 2002 by Melissa TrudingerAn innovative approach in reaching out to shareholders has raised $AU3 million for Melbourne-based biotech company Meditech Research.
Panbio appoints new CEO to drive expansion
29 November, 2002 by Pete YoungDiagnostics company Panbio has reached into the senior ranks of DuPont for a growth-oriented chief executive officer to oversee its next period of planned expansion.
