An article in Reason braces for a world with more DNA screening.

A blogger suggests that each author's contribution to a paper should be enumerated.

The outgoing President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology has suggestions for the incoming council.

While the RNAi field has advanced considerably over the past 12 months, it is a growing appreciation of therapeutic RNAi’s potential for immune stimulation and the need for rigorous experimentation standards, highlighted by two key publications, that is likely to define the past year.

Two new studies published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that patients with reduced-function alleles of CYP2C19 who had been treated with clopidogrel have a higher rate of major cardiovascular events than those without the alleles. One of the studies was funded by Eli Lilly and Daiichi Sankyo, companies that currently have a competing anti-platelet agent under review at the US Food and Drug Administration.

A Rosetta official also provided pricing details for the company’s first three microRNA-based diagnostics, and said that these are expected to generate revenues between $5 million and $9 million during 2009.

Clinical Data in 2009 plans to focus on driving adoption of its Familion genetic tests for cardiac conditions and expanding its Fc gamma receptor pathways biomarker validation program for monoclonal antibodies.

Issam Zineh discusses new drug labeling projects and pharmacogenomic initiatives at the Food and Drug Administration in the coming year.

Despite the difficult economic climate, a number of RNAi and microRNA drug developers were able to secure important alliances, or even buyouts, with big pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms over the course of 2008.

GW REPORTS

The Massachusetts Life Sciences Center is betting that the first-ever grants, which will be matched dollar-for-dollar by participating industry partners, will help stimulate the state’s life sciences economy by driving promising biomedical technologies to market and by encouraging further public-private research collaborations.

The four startups round out a 2008 fiscal year in which Oregon Health and Science University saw growth in a number of technology transfer metrics, including issued patents, patent applications, licensing or option agreements, licensing revenues, and sponsored research agreements, according to statistics OHSU released earlier this year.

Genomic Health, FDA, Roche, Medcan Clinic, PGXL, Leerink Swann, NIH, Case Medical Center, Exact Sciences, Virginia Commonwealth University

Mark Crowell, Nava Swersky Sofer, Yehuda Yarmut

European Molecular Biology Organization

USPTO Publishes 15 RNAi-Related Patent Applications

Wafik El-Deiry, a professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, will collaborate with Morphotek under a sponsored research agreement to develop therapeutic antibody candidates targeting an antigen associated with hypoxic regions in tumors. Meantime, an unrelated spinout founded by El-Deiry in 2004 may finally have found the foothold it needs to advance its p53-based cancer drug-discovery program.

NEWSBRIEF

NEWSBRIEF

Kinetic Concepts, Wake Forest U, Convatec, Boehringer, University of California, Cytori, Urigen, UCSD, VistaGen, WARF, MabVax, MSKCC

NEWSBRIEF

Sarah Imbach, Mark Lewis

Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, Immune Disease Institute, Baxter Healthcare, Epic Therapeutics, RXi Pharmaceuticals, University of Massachusetts Medical School, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Tekmira Pharmaceuticals, Isis Pharmaceuticals, Abbott, Ibis Biosc

Cloud computing is on the rise.

The New York Times covers personalized medicine.