NCBiotech News

It isn't because he's so successful at avoiding rivalries by holding concurrent professorships at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University.

Joseph DeSimone, Ph.D., is just plain successful.

The promise of nanotechnology was weighed with its unknowns and potential downsides during a recent gathering of some 150 invited guests for the 2009 Summit on Environmentally Responsible Development of Nanotechnology, hosted by the Research Triangle Environmental Health Collaborative.

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill faculty surgeon Thomas Egan, M.D., M.Sc., has just added a $1.47 million federal grant to his recent spate of activity.

This year's Charlotte Biotechnology Conference was everything a one-day conference event should be. It started at a time where attendees could travel to Charlotte from elsewhere in the state, it brought in some impressive and engaging speakers, and it had a diverse attendance list that made networking fun. Oh, and the food was some of the best I've had at a conference.

Durham start-up Catena Pharmaceuticals, bootstrapped last year with a $50,000 low-interest loan from the North Carolina Biotechnology Center, will strut its stuff on the main stage of the 2009 SEBIO Investor Forum being held Dec. 3 and 4 in Charleston, S.C.

Catena, which is focused on developing an anti-cancer therapy, is the only North Carolina company picked for a main stage presentation this year. Another dozen firms from the seven-state region also made the cut, from among dozens of applicants.

Raleigh's Micell Technologies has drawn the attention--and a $15 million investment--from global medical technologies giant St. Jude Medical.

Micell, which employs 10 people, is developing coating systems that can be used to deliver drugs via medical devices such as the wire-mesh stents now in routine use to open clogged arteries in the heart.

Opportunities in marine biotechnology, biofuels, and agricultural biotechnology are among the hopeful targets of North Carolina Public Television special.

The hour-long program aired Sept. 2 on UNC-TV.

Students from the life-science programs at UNC-Chapel Hill and Duke University crowded into the Biotechnology Center today to learn how to make the challenging leap from an academic environment to an industry job.

The attendees got to network with post doctorates currently in the Center's Industrial Fellowship program and mingle with top industry executives from North Carolina's biotechnology companies.

The academic and company laboratories in and around the North Carolina Research Campus will need workers trained in a range of specific techniques.

Enter Rowan-Cabarrus Community College, which today broke ground on a 62,000-square-foot training facility. The community turned out in force for the ceremony, two blocks from the Research Campus' famed core-laboratory facility.

All service businesses are hurting for revenues these days, including Contract Research Organizations.

Yonnie Butler, the Biotechnology Center's business development director, had some insight that he thought would help. This issue of Tablets & Capsules contains his advice.

Interested in the promise of biotechnology, but not sure how to bring it to the classroom?

Been teaching science a long time, but looking for some new ideas?

Sign up for one of our annual summer teacher workshops. The week-long classes are held across the state and are open to North Carolina teachers.

A $50 registration fee holds your place, and most workshops pay a stipend and give you access to free laboratory supplies for the coming year.

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When our economy recovers, it's a good bet that the biotechnology sector will be one of those sectors leading the way.

Merck enters an agreement to buy clinical-stage startup VelosBio for $2.75 billion.

Syneos Health, one of the biggest contract service providers in the sector is getting even bigger through the acquisition of Synteract.

For more than 30 years, Genova Diagnostics has been quietly growing its clinical laboratory services from its headquarters in Asheville, evolving into the significant new world of precision health services.