More Effective Drugs for Fewer Patients
The pharmaceutical industry is facing two major trends that threaten its routine business model. On the one hand, the industry must compete with its own past successes. New drugs not only have be effective but have to be proven more effective than current ones. As a result, increasing research efforts are required for new drug development and new drugs face more regulatory challenges than earlier medicines for the same diseases....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - October 24, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
How Far Will the Biomedical Battle against Death Go?
This Halloween season has me wondering about science's fight to conquer death. Much of biomedical research is focused on extending life and preventing death. How far can science push back the inevitable, though, and is it really inevitable? Is immortality a possibility? What about reversing death? Would the Frankenstein fantasy ever be feasible or zombies?...Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - October 16, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Initiative Gets $1.3M to Validate Published Cancer Research Findings
As described previously, there is a significant problem with many published findings in peer-reviewed life science research journals. Many of the results in these studies simply cannot be replicated independently. While the quality of published data has been a recognized concern in much of the biomedical research community, solutions to the problem have been limited....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - October 14, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Mouse Study Changes Approach to Developing Alzheimer's Treatment
Researchers at the University of Leicester in the UK showed that brain degeneration in mice with prion disease can be stopped if the animals are fed a specific chemical. The study has been widely hailed as a possible turning point for the treatment of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other neurodegenerative diseases....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - October 8, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Vaccination Protects against Norovirus Symptoms
While not usually life threatening, norovirus infection produces a very discomforting gastrointestinal illness that affects tens of millions annually. As one of the most common viral infections that rivals the flu and is the bane of cruise ship vacationers, norovirus is sometimes called the stomach flu. In fact, though, it is a distinct virus from the flu virus--influenza. Norovirus causes inflammation of the stomach and intestines. Influenza, on the other hand, affects the respiratory system....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - September 29, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Making Biomedical Research Credible Again
Many, if not most, peer-reviewed biomedical studies cannot be replicated independently. Surprised? Researchers working to develop new drugs that have tried to replicate publications are not.
A recent survey in PLOS One of researchers at MD Anderson, one of the premier Cancer Research institutions in the world, again substantiates the poor reliability of published research that has come up repeatedly over the last few years...Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - September 18, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
BGI Sequencing Facility at UC Davis
It's been almost two years since the UC Davis and China-based DNA Sequencing powerhouse BGI agreed to establish the BGI@Davis Joint Genome Center. Now one of the largest academic DNA sequencing facilities in the US is open for business. To celebrate, BGI held its second annual conference on Genomics, ICG 2013, in Sacramento last week just 10 miles away from the UC Davis campus....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - September 11, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Gene Mutation Causing Children's Leukemia Found
A single mutation of the PAX5 gene has been identified as a cause of the most common type of cancer in children--acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). Seventy researchers from institutions across North America, as well as, in the the Netherlands and Australia published the findings yesterday....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - September 6, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Obesity, Gut Bacteria, and Poop Transplants
A study just released in Science shows that mice that receive intestinal bacterial from fat people get fatter than mice colonized with gut bacteria from thin people. The results demonstrate how bacteria in the digestive tract affect body weight....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - August 28, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Connection between Red Hair and Melanoma Risk
Last week researchers reported they found a mutation that appears to explain the increased risk red headed individuals have of getting melanoma--the most serious type of skin cancer.
There are actually two types of melanin: yellow-red pheomelanin and black-brown eumelanin. It's the mix of these two melanin forms that defines the underlying skin and hair color. However, as is obvious to anyone that has spent the day at the beach, the ratio of two types of melanin can change in response to exposure to the sun in most people....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - August 23, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
MERS and SARS: Two Deadly but Different Cousins
About a year ago, an outbreak of new and deadly respiratory virus outbreak occured in the Middle East. The virus closely resembled another one that caused an outbreak about 10 years ago in China--the SARS coronavirus. While similar, however, the two viruses are not identical, and the appearance of this new SARS-like virus caused considerable concern about another deadly outbreak....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - August 20, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Vandalism of Golden Rice GMO Trials
Two weeks ago anti-GMO activists destroyed a field of genetically-modified (GM) Golden Rice being grown as a trial by the Philippines Department of Agriculture. The site was one of five involved in a government assessment to determine whether the crop would be suitable for general cultivation in the country....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - August 7, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
NIH SBIR/STTR Grants: Seed Funding for Biotech Development
You may have a great idea for a new diagnostic, drug, or technology but developing, testing, and commercializing it takes money. One very viable source for a biotech start-ups in the US are SBIR and STTR Small Business Technology Development grants....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - July 29, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
Booming Biotech
Last year saw the biotech market recover much of its pre-2008 momentum. Many of the sector's stocks soared above pre-crash levels and more venture capital was freed up to fund start-ups and expansions. As we pass the 2013 mid-point, the rally remains strong....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - July 27, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
At the Intersection of Biotech, Hi Tech, and Fashion
I got a new toy a few weeks ago--a Fitbit Flex. To call it a pedometer would almost be like calling an iPhone a telegraph. However, the function is essentially the same. It is a small electronic unit a little over an inch long and less than a half inch wide that fits into a wrist band....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical)
Source: About.com Biotech Biomedical - July 17, 2013 Category: Biotechnology Source Type: news
