This week’s headlines include, largest cancer gene database public, stem cell news, BMS mab to dominate NSCLC drug market, Lilly plans big Alzheimer’s study, and H7N9 likely resistant to antivirals.

Cell Culture Dish Feature – Ask the Expert:

Our Next Session – Innovations in Cultureware

In the past cultureware has mostly been focused on culturing standard cell lines that have historically been easy to culture. However, with the explosion of stem cell culture and the now common practice of culturing many different cell types, cultureware has needed to evolve as well. Over the years, improvements have been developed to increase the success of cultureware and to provide a more hospitable cell-growing environment, including innovations like gas-plasma treatment and biological extracellular matrices. Yet there is still opportunity to improve cultureware and address some of the most common challenges cell culture scientists face. Please join us and submit your questions about cultureware, please share your challenges and also questions you may have about the latest products in this area.

The expert for this session is Graziella Mendonsa, Ph.D., Product Manager at MIDSCI. Please take advantage of the opportunity to ask Graziella a question and participate in a lively discussion about the latest cultureware innovations!

Cell Culture Events:

Introduction to Cell Culture – August 20-23, 2013

This 4-day cell culture workshop is designed for those with no or extensive cell culture experience. Topics include an introduction to cell and tissue culture, serum containing and serum-free media, adaptation to serum-free media, cell counting and viability staining, growth curve development, growth of suspension and adherent cells, transfection technologies, cryopreservation methods, cell cloning and primary culture.

Scheduled workshops take place in Baltimore, Maryland. All of our workshops can be conducted at your location if needed. If you have questions or want more specific course content please contact our website, www.biosciconcepts.com or call us at 410-752-4224.

Headlines:

“Largest Cancer Gene Database Made Public,” Reuters

National Cancer Institute scientists have released the largest-ever database of cancer-related genetic variations, providing researchers the most comprehensive way so far to figure out how to target treatments for the disease. Open access worldwide to the new database, based on genome studies, is expected to help researchers accelerate development of new drugs and better match patients with therapies, NCI said in a statement on Monday.”

If you like this story, please see our blog titled “New and Improved Cultureware is Designed with the Scientist in Mind”

“Do Clinical Trials Work?” The New York Times

“EVERY spring, some 30,000 oncologists, medical researchers and marketers gather in an American city to showcase the latest advances in cancer treatment. But at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology last month, much of the buzz surrounded a study that was anything but a breakthrough. To a packed and whisper-quiet room at the McCormick Place convention center in Chicago, Mark R. Gilbert, a professor of neuro-oncology at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, presented the results of a clinical trial testing the drug Avastin in patients newly diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme, an aggressive brain cancer. In two earlier, smaller studies of patients with recurrent brain cancers, tumors shrank and the disease seemed to stall for several months when patients were given the drug, an antibody that targets the blood supply of these fast-growing masses of cancer cells.”

If you like this story, please see our blog titled “A New WAVE for the Future”

“Study: H7N9 Likely Resistant to Current Antiviral Drugs,” Fierce Biotech Research

“As the newest strain of avian influenza, H7N9, continues to spread, scientists are urgently trying to figure out how to thwart transmission of the deadly virus. A new study published in mBio, a journal of the American Society for Microbiology, found that some strains of the H7N9 avian influenza that emerged in China this year have developed resistance to the only antiviral drugs on the market intended to treat the infection. What makes treating the disease even more complicated is the tendency for antiviral resistance testing to produce misleading results, encouraging the spread of resistant H7N9 strains, the study found. No approved H7N9 vaccine exists yet.”

If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Interesting Late Stage Viral Vaccine Candidates”

“Lilly Plans Big Alzheimer’s Disease Study After Prior Failures,” Reuters

“Despite two failed late-stage trials of its experimental Alzheimer’s drug solanezumab, Eli Lilly and Co said on Friday it plans to run yet another study, this time focusing only on mild patients who appeared to respond to the treatment. And the company will take extra steps to ensure it is testing actual Alzheimer’s patients by pre-screening them with its imaging agent Amyvid to ensure they have deposits of the protein beta amyloid that is linked with the disease.”

If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Perfusion Bioreactors – With so much to offer they deserve a closer look”

“Scientists Uncover Role of Lamins in Stem Cells,” Science World Report

“Scientists have been able to uncover some clues regarding the amazing powers of stem cells. According to new work from Carnegie’s Yixian Zheng and Haiyang Chen, they’ve helped identify an important component for regulating stem cell niches that impact on tissue building and function that could have potential implications for disease research. Lamins, known as proteins that the major structural component of the material that lines the inside of a cell’s nucleus, have diverse functions, including suppressing gene expression and have been rather difficult to understand how mutations in them can cause diseases to grow in specific tissues and organs, including skeletal muscles, heart muscles and fat.

If you like this story, please see our blog titled “From Product Candidate to Product: The Road to Commercialization in Regenerative Medicine”

“B-MS’ Nivolumab “To Dominate NSCLC Drug Market by 2022,” PharmaTimes

“Bristol-Myers Squibb’s nivolumab will overtake proven blockbuster competitors to dominate the non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treatment market, following an expected launch in 2015, according to new forecasts. Nivolumab, a first-in-class immunotherapy, will become the overall NSCLC market sales leader by 2022, reaching revenues of $1.75 billion in the key global markets of the US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, China and India, says a new report from GlobalData.”

If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Continuous Processing: From Cookie Preparation to Cell-Based Production”

“With Magnetic Nanoparticles Healing Stem Cells Can Be Steered Within the Body,” Medical Daily

“Using magnets, a group of scientists have devised a new method to internally direct the healing power of stem cells. In a study published in the journal Small, a team of researchers from Emory University and Georgia Tech found that by coating mesenchymal stem cells in tiny iron oxide particles, magnets can be used to attract the cells and steer them towards a particular location within the body.

If you like this story, please see our blog titled “Cell Line Authentication – A discussion on protecting research against cell line contamination”