News Archive

A veteran biotechnology reporter once complained privately that covering the industry was like watching grass grow—companies seemed to inch by slow degrees toward products and profits, sustained by a dwindling stream of funding.

For an antidote to that dreary picture, consider the swift developments at StartX Med, a life sciences accelerator program founded by Stanford University students in 2012. It’s a health care-oriented offshoot of StartX, the original student-initiated incubator program for researchers and others affiliated with Stanford.

BIO’s announced agreement with National Science Foundation (NSF) to bring SBIR-funded, early-stage biotech companies to present at BIO Investor Forum 2013. Presenting companies in NSF track include ADMdx, Biodesy, Carmot, CertiChem, Jade Therapeutics, Nano3D Biosciences, Nanofiber Solutions, Parabon Nanolabs, Stemina, and Tymora Analytical Operations. All are funded by NSF and focused on drug discovery, diagnostics, and other platform technologies.

As health systems and hospitals consolidate and battle for patients, they are starting to employ online consumer marketing efforts. A new Provider Web Presence Index is now available to track the success of providers.

Payer+Provider Syndicate has created the Provider Web Presence Index, which was released Tuesday, and evaluates the quality of the web presence of hospitals compared with competitors. The tool is based on a single indicator, which incorporates measures of web traffic, inbound linking and site relevance.

When Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Intuitive Surgical hit the market in 1999 with its surgical robot, da Vinci, the company and many of its early adopters hailed the new technology as a revolution that would benefit patients, surgeons and the health care system as a whole. Da Vinci combines high-definition visual tools with robot-guided medical instruments that allow surgeons to do complicated procedures using a few tiny incisions. The da Vinci system, which is widely used in urologic surgeries such as the removal of prostate tumors, has been shown by Intuitive and outside researchers to reduce post-surgery complications and shorten hospital stays.

Two days into a government shutdown over resulting from the Congressional showdown over funding Obamacare, funding is at the front of mind for many researchers who rely at least partially on grants from National Institutes of Health and other government sources. A survey of 608 translational researchers revealed that although insufficient funding is a significant barrier to the path to commercializing their work, there are other related challenges that are just as critical to their future.

How can translational researchers improve the rate of reproducible results? What other factors are undercutting funding? Where can they find collaboration opportunities?

The STEM workforce in the DC area is sizable and totals about 330,000 workers. Some of these employees are retiring, some are changing jobs, and others are getting promotions leaving positions open. The healthy STEM climate means that there are a lot of job opportunities at all levels. But where do your students find STEM jobs? On TCM’s targeted career center, CORE.

CORE is a comprehensive resource for finding all levels of biotechnology, technology, and business jobs in the Mid-Atlantic region.CORE provides detailed job and internship listings in 15 categories that are updated frequently and promoted through our social media channels for easy access. Many companies in the area that hire STEM workers are TCM members and are vested in hiring local talent. So prepare your students for success and direct them to CORE. In addition to job listings, we also offer timely career resource articles to help students meet the many challenges of their job search.

Want to show your students that you’re committed to their future? Purchase a banner ad on the CORE website to let local companies know about the courses, certificates, and degrees you offer to prepare your students for STEM jobs.

The University of Maryland School of Medicine’s Center for Vaccine Development announced on Thursday that it has received a renewed contract from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for its research and clinical studies.

“The University of Maryland’s Center for Vaccine Development has long been a partner of the federal government in the clinical evaluation of vaccines,” Karen L. Kotloff, a professor of pediatrics and medicine and the head of infectious disease and tropical pediatrics at the University of Maryland’s School of Medicine, said. “Renewal of our contract is a testimony to our expertise in helping protect people throughout the world against diseases that pose significant public health threats.”

The Department of Health and Human Services isn’t the only federal agency interested in funding medical research.

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Department of Defense’s primary innovation engine that’s responsible for developing new technologies for use by the military, also frequently undertakes project in biology, medicine and neuroscience.

After nearly 17 years, Elaine Amir, executive director of Johns Hopkins University Montgomery County Campus, retired, effective Sept. 30. Elaine has been the face of Johns Hopkins in Montgomery County and a leader on several community boards and initiatives. Through her work, she touched many lives, both personally and professionally.

Before she left, Hopkins Happenings asked her to look back on her years leading JHU MCC:

Improving health literacy and patient engagement and developing alternative ways to appraise apps and physicians are among the ideas that have reached the finals of a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation competition. The people and companies behind these ideas are vying for the opportunity to get funding as part of a program to fund transformative innovations in healthcare.

Among the judges are Angel investor Esther Dyson (@edyson), PatientsLikeMe Co-Founder and President Ben Heywood (@patientslikeme), Rhode Island School of Design President John Maeda(@johnmaeda), IDEO Life Sciences Chief Strategist Rodrigo Martinez(@rodrigoatcg), Games for Health Co-Founder Ben Sawyer (@bensawyer), Fast Company Staff Writer Ben Schiller(@btschiller) and NPR Science Correspondent Shankar Vedantam(@hiddenbrain).