• GSK Launches Hostile Takeover Bid for Human Genome Sciences

    Baltimore Sun | GlaxoSmithKline has launched a hostile takeover bid for long-time partner Human Genome Sciences worth $2.6 billion, or $13/share. 

    May 9, 2012

  • Manolis Kellis, Epigenetics, and the Future of Fighting Disease

    Bio-IT World | BOSTON—Manolis Kellis, professor of computer science at MIT, addressed the Bio-IT World Conference on efforts to revolutionize the study of human disease by bridging the gap between genetics and epigenetics. 

    May 9, 2012

  • Introducing the Bina Box

    Technology Review | Bina Technologies is throwing its hat into the genome analysis ring with an in-house analyzer that can upload the resulting genetic profiles to the company's cloud-hosted site for data management, sharing, and aggregation. 

    May 8, 2012

  • Editors' Asian Favorites

    Bio-IT World | Bio-IT World has invited a group of superb world-renowned speakers from across Asia, Europe, and North America for its very first conference in Asia (Marina Bay Sands, Singapore; June 6-8, 2012). They will present the latest advances in research and technology in areas such as next-gen sequencing, personalized medicine, high-performance and cloud computing, bioinformatics, drug discovery and development, and translational research. Read on for some of the editor's favorites. 

    May 7, 2012

  • The Merits of Data Sharing in Tackling Rare Diseases

    Bio-IT World | BOSTON—Alex Sherman, director of systems in neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) presented promising new initiatives in the battle against rare diseases at the Bio-IT World Conference. Sherman proposed a model for dealing with the many obstacles that confront research on rare diseases. 

    May 7, 2012

  • Biosimilars Gain Ground in Europe

    Forbes | Thanks to enabling legislation and differing clinical trials requirements, Europe moves further ahead in biosimilar sales.

    May 7, 2012

  • Dagdigian’s Trends in IT Highlight Bio-IT World Expo

    Bio-IT World | BOSTON—“Filter my words accordingly; I’m not a pundit or visionary,” began Chris Dagdigian in a superfluous introduction to his annual “trends in the trenches” review at the Bio-IT World Expo last week. 

    May 3, 2012

  • Oxford Nanopore Announces a Further $50 Million fundraising

    Bio-IT World | Oxford Nanopore has raised an additional $50 million from private investors as it seeks to build up the commercial and manufacturing infrastructure in preparation for commercial launch of its next-gen sequencing system later this year.  

    May 3, 2012

  • May Free Trials & Downloads

     Bio-IT World | Free trials and downloads for May. 

    May 3, 2012

  • GSK, Yale Enter Drug Discovery Collaboration

    Hartford Business Journal | GlaxoSmithKline and Yale have entered a new drug discovery partnership focused on potential medications to target disease-causing proteins. 

    May 3, 2012

  • Big Pharma and Rare Diseases: Finding a Balance

    Forbes | Rare diseases affect fewer than 200,000 individuals, but the small consumer pool hasn't negated research for these diseases, rather good drugs for rare diseases can make pharma companies quite a lot of money. Finding a balance between the profits and patients, though, is always a bit tricky.

    May 3, 2012

  • Biotech's Takeover Protection Thanks to a Few Big Investors

    Reuters | Biotech's ability to fight off Big Pharma is due to a handful of large investors that dominate the companies' shares registries.

    May 2, 2012

  • The Off-Label Drug War of Words

    Bio-IT World | The Skeptical Outsider | If knowledge is power and ignorance is bliss, what is power used to prevent knowledge from eliminating ignorance? I don’t know; ask the FDA. 

    May 1, 2012

  • UC Santa Cruz Launches Cancer Genomics Hub

    UC Santa Cruz | The University of California, Santa Cruz has established the Cancer Genomics Hub (CGHub), a large-scale data repository and user portal for the National Cancer Institute's cancer genome research programs. 

    May 2, 2012

  • IBM Cloud Used to Track Counterfeit Drugs

    eWeek | IBM and Sproxil have teamed up to use IBM's visualization, analytics, and cloud capabilities to detect and prevent drug counterfeiting. Sproxil provides patients with verification of a drug's authenticity via free text message. 

    May 1, 2012

  • Bina Technologies Wants to Remake Genome Analysis

    GigaOM | Stanford spin-out Bina Technologies emerged from stealth mode last week at the Bio-IT World Expo, aiming to bring an Apple-like business model to genomics with a unique combination of hardware and cloud technologies.  

    May 1, 2012

  • Eric Perakslis’ Informatics Prescription for FDA

    Bio-IT World | BOSTON—Eric Perakslis, recently installed as the chief information officer and chief scientist (informatics) at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), gave delegates at the Bio-IT World Conference a snapshot of his new role at the agency. 

    Apr 30, 2012

  • A Broad Perspective on Genome Data at Bio-IT World Expo

    Bio-IT World | BOSTON—Jill Mesirov and Martin Leach—the Broad Institute’s chief informatics and chief information officers, respectively—stressed themes of integrative biology and big data in a twin-bill opening keynote session at the 10th anniversary Bio-IT World Conference & Expo last week. 

    Apr 30, 2012

  • April New Products

    Bio-IT World | A summary of the new products in bio-IT released in the past month--from new hybrid-core computers, to NGS software, to qPCR tools, to clinical trial management--many of which were announced at the Bio-IT World Conference & Expo. 

    Apr 30, 2012

  • Open Source Health Data Repository Launched

    Nature | A project based in Kansas City, Missouri, aims to create the world's largest pool of open data about health and genomics. The data themselves will come from a variety of sources including consumer-reported direct-to-consumer genomic testing results.

    Apr 26, 2012