The Dish’s Weekly Biotechnology News Wrap Up – April 1, 2016

April 01, 2016 Written by Brandy Sargent

This week’s biotechnology news headlines include, Zika news, Sun Pharma to buy Japanese brands from Novartis, FDA review times steadily decreasing, Maxcyte public offering in London, Alder surges as drug meets migraine goals, Regeneron and Bayer partner on eye disease combination therapy, and Japanese approval for GSK and AZ drugs.

Cell Culture Events

Webinars:

Taking control of glycosylation – In vitro Glycoengineering

Thursday, April 14, 2016, 11:00am EST Overview and Session Highlights: Glycosylation has the potential to make or prevent market entry of a drug. Unlike the limited manipulation drug fermentation, in vitro glycoengineering enables the creation of high levels of galactosylation or sialylation to unambiguously select and implement the structure with the best therapeutic and pharmacokinetic profile. Roland Dorn (Roche Custom Biotech IPM), and Marco Thomann (Roche Pharmaceuticals) will share insights on:

Criteria to assess applicability of in vitroglycoengineering (IVGE) in development and manufacturing of bio-pharmaceuticals
Integration of IVGE into the downstream process
1-pot reaction: combination of galactosylation and sialylation in one reaction
Scale-ability of IVGE reaction
Case studies from Roche Pharma

To Register:Please visit please visit the webinar dedicated microsite or the Custom Biotech website. If you are not able to join the webinar, you are welcome to register here and view the webinar on demand at a more convenient point in time.

Bioprocess Insights Webinar Series:

Upstream – How to Improve Productivity and Process Economy Through Intensified Seed Train Strategies

Wed, Apr 20, 2016 – Time:11:00 AM EDT – Duration:30 minutes Dr. Andreas Castan will discuss the upstream seed train and will show how a process intensification strategy can be used to compress timelines and decrease the cost for this unit operation. Register Now.

Conferences:

April

Cell Line Development and Engineering –April 11-13 2016, Vienna, Austria http://www.informa-ls.com/event/CellLine16 Bioprocess International European Summit – April 11-14, 2016 – Vienna, Austria http://www.informa-ls.com/event/BPI2016 PEGS Boston – April 25-29, 2016 – Seaport World Trade Center – Boston, MA http://www.pegsummit.com/ Interphex – April 26-28, 2016 Javits Center, New York City http://www.interphex.com/

May

TIDES – May 9-12, 2016 – Long Beach, CA http://www.ibclifesciences.com/TIDES/overview.xml World Stem Cells Regenerative Medicine Conference – May 18-20, 2016 – London, UK http://www.terrapinn.com/conference/stem-cells/index.stm World Cord Blood Conference – May 18-19, 2016 – London, UK http://www.terrapinn.com/conference/world-cord-blood-congress-europe/index.stm World Precision Medicine – May 18-19, 2016 – London, UK http://www.terrapinn.com/conference/world-precision-medicine-congress/index.stm ISCT – May 25-28, 2016 – Singapore http://www.celltherapysociety.org/?page=ISCT2016 Cell Culture World Congress USA – May 19-20, 2016 – Hilton San Diego Resort and Spa – San Diego, CA http://www.terrapinn.com/conference/cell-culture-world-congress-usa/index.stm

June

BIO International Convention – June 6-9, 2016 – San Francisco, CA http://convention.bio.org/ Cell Line Development & Engineering – June 13-15, 2016 – Parc 55 Wyndham San Francisco, CA http://www.ibclifesciences.com/CellLine/overview.xml Co-located with Bioconjugates: From Targets to Therapeutics – http://www.ibclifesciences.com/Bioconjugates/overview.xml Next Generation Protein Therapeutics Summit – http://www.ibclifesciences.com/ProteinSummit/overview.xml Annual Meeting of the International Society for Stem Cell Research – June 22-25, 2016, San Francisco, CA http://www.isscr.org/home/annual-meeting/san-francisco-2016 Progress in Continuous Biomanufacturing – June 27-28, 2016 – Robinson College, Cambridge, UK The conference is enhanced by the participation of several leading industrial technologists, scientific, vendors and also leading academics from Europe and USA. They have come forward to share their experience and knowledge to provide a better understanding of the current technologies and their application in continuous biomanufacturing. There is also a plenary lecture by a distinguished professor in the field of bioprocessing, and you will also benefit from access to unpublished data. This meeting will address several advancements and their successful application with data in the Technology both Upstream and downstream and also on Initiatives to process developments and project to the future direction of the industry. By joining with us you can benefit from the current state of-the-art advancements in continuous manufacturing and also learn about the successful organisations that are developing and applying these methods in-house. http://www.subramanian.org.uk/ Viral Safety and Raw Materials – June 2016, Vienna, Austria http://www.informa-ls.com/event/empoweredantibodies15

Headlines

“Team of Rival Scientists Comes Together to Fight Zika,” The New York Times

“With the Zika virus spreading largely unchecked in Latin America and the Caribbean by way of a now-notorious insect, some of the nation’s leading mosquito researchers are striving to assemble a state-of-the-art DNA map that they say will help them fight the disease with the mosquito’s own genetic code.” If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Adipose- and Bone Marrow-Derived hMSCs: What’s the Difference?”

“Sun Pharma to Buy Japanese Brands From Novartis in $293 Million Deal,” The Wall Street Journal

“Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. said it had agreed to buy 14 prescription brands from Novartis AG in a $293 million cash deal that would expand the Indian company’s footprint into Japan.” If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Cool Tool – New ACF Medium to Expand and Differentiate Human Hematopoietic Cells into Erythroid Cells”

“FDA Review Times Steadily Decreasing, Report Finds,” Regulatory Focus

“Despite wide variations across therapeutic areas, FDA review times for new drugs have steadily declined since 2009, according to a report released Tuesday by the California Life Sciences Association and Boston Consulting Group.” If you like this story, please see our blog titled “BPI West 2016 – BioProcess International Conference – In case you missed it!”

“Gaithersburg-based Maxcyte heads to London for a $15 million public offering,” The Washington Post

“Maxcyte, a Maryland-based biotechnology company that sells and licenses cell engineering technology to pharmaceutical companies, traveled across the pond this week to become the region’s newest public company.” If you like this story, please see our blog titled “2015 FDA New Drug Approvals – 13 Biologics Receive Approval”

“Alder Surges as Drug Meets Migraine Goals in Mid-Stage Trial,” Bloomberg Business

“Alder Biopharmaceuticals Inc. rose as much as 62 percent, its biggest intraday gain ever, after saying that its experimental infusion to prevent migraines met the main goals of a mid-stage trial.” If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Improving Protein Productivity in CHO Biomanufacturing using Media Supplementation”

“Regeneron, Bayer Partner to Develop Eye Disease Combination Therapy,” Genetic Engineering News

“Regeneron and Bayer said today they will develop combination therapies for eye diseases through an additional collaboration that could generate up to $130 million-plus for Regeneron.” If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Cool Tools – BrainPhys™: A New Way to Culture Neurons”

“Japanese approval for GSK, AZ drugs,” PharmaTimes

“GlaxoSmithKline’s novel biologic Nucala has picked up an approval in Japan for the treatment of bronchial asthma.” If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Enabling High Density Cell Banking using a Single-Use, Closed-System