News and views from the St. Louis life science community
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July 2006
July 27, 2006
Colbert on Stem Cells
July 26, 2006
CORTEX Website
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Last night while scanning for news I came upon the new website for the CORTEX life science development district! In all seriousness, I've been waiting to see a real web presence from the group since about when construction began on their beautiful beautiful building.
Overall, nice website - a little Flash-ful for my taste, but still laid out fairly well. Worth noticing: Check out numbers provided under the "The Community" tab. They're aimed at giving some background stats on biotech in the region - BUT - even for a booster like me, they smell kind of fishy.
-Number of plant and life science companies? CORTEX says 1,183. RCGA says "nearly 400".
-Number of regional jobs? CORTEX says 79,000. RCGA says 15,220. This one I think I can explain. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics gives regional values for employment in both "Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services" and "Scientific, Research, and Development Services". If you add up those values for May,St. Louis ends up with just under 79,000. I don't really think its fair to imply those are all biotech, though
-Nearly $1B in VC funding earmarked for biotech? Again, RCGA lists only about half of that. That value may well have increased, though, especially with the national rise in VC recruitment lately.
It's great that we're doing better with the regional biotech growth. BUT it would be nice to have a single set of reliable values to judge ourselves by, rather than just trying to catch the attention of people outside of the region.
July 23, 2006
Do the eyes have it?
Hand me the chart!
Triathlon Seed Investment
Dupont biofuels initiative
VC funding up
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AP reported last week that venture capitalists secured $11.2 billion in investments during the second quarter, a 5-year record. Much of this seems to be going into the "second internet bubble", investments in creativity services like blogs and media hosting.
July 22, 2006
Events for the week of July 23, 2006
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- All week: SLU Cook School of Business: Jump-Start-Your-Independence
- Wed: Skandalaris Center Coffee with the Experts (Professional Services)
July 19, 2006
Events: RCGS Plant and Life Science Network
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The June meeting of the St. Louis RCGA Plant and Life Science Network will be this Friday evening at Washington University's West Campus. View the link for more information and to RSVP.
St. Louis biotech development makes news
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Biobelt.org today released a feature from Dow Jones Newswires reporting on the St. Louis region's recent increase in biotech development. If you're new to the subject, I'd reccommend the read.
Good to see the St. Louis RCGA putting posting biotech news again
Virgin named head of pathology and immunology
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Wash U news releases have a thing with the witty headlines lately.
Seriously though, congrats to Dr. Virgin.
Chistophe Mérieux dies at age 39
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Chistophe Mérieux, VP R&D for international diagnostics firm bioMérieux and next in line for CEO, died July 14th from a heart attack. His brother Alexandre Mérieux, 32, is now next in line for leadership of the family business. Many condolances for the Mérieux family. bioMérieux employs nearly 600 people in their R&D / Marketing facility in Hazelwood.
Chistophe Mérieux (left) with his brother and parents
Veto
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As expected, this afternoon President Bush used the first veto of his two terms in office to block adoption of the recently passed stem-cell legislation. Although the President did not allow cameras to witness the actual event, he appeared soon after surrounded by a group of "Snowflake Children". Video via CNN.
July 18, 2006
Final Vote: 63-37
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HR 810, the senate bill to expand federal funding of stem-cell research, passed by a final vote of 63-37. Both Sen. Bond (R-MO) and Sen. Talent (R-MO) voted in the negative. Despite the bipartisan result, this final tally is not enough to prevent a promised veto by President Bush.
The two "alternative" bills, S 3504 and S2754, passed 100-0.
July 17, 2006
Stem Cells! Everywhere!
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Everyone who's anyone is in a mess this week about a triad of stem cell bills being debated in front of the US Senate. Debating started today, in preparation for the vote tomorrow, and yours truly proudly watched a good 2 hours of the fun. On a side note, no wonder nothing gets done in congress - no one is actually working! Between quorum calls every 15 minutes, dramatic debates over who gets to talk next, and Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) interjecting a bit of poetry about the anniversary of the signing of the U.S. Constitution, the whole thing is quite the carnival.
Anyhow, the three bills all had "something" to do with how to fund stem cell research. The biggie, HR 810, allows federally-funded researchers to use embyronic stem-cell lines created after Pres. Bush's August 2001 moratorium. It also restricts human cloning and tweaks the restrictions on stem-cell MTA's, though how I'm not exactly sure. HR 810 passed the House on May 24th, and it's looking to get through the senate too, but not by a large enough margin to scare off a Presidential Veto.
The other two bills, to paraphrase Sen. Byran Dorgan (D-ND), forbid something that isn't done and allows something already allowed. S 3504 forbids so-called "fetus farming", the production of human fetuses for tissue extraction. S 2754, meanwhile, asks the government to further promote adult stem-cell research.
Probably more interesting than the floor debate, though, was the running commentary by the scientific community. This morning, a letter appeared in Science Express attacking several of the talking points used by Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS) to challenge the embryonic stem-cell bill. In a nice hometown connection, the letter was authored by William Neaves, of the KC-based Stower's Institute, and Washington University's own Dr. Steven Teitelbaum.
Finally, on another local note, Sen. Jim Talent (R-MO) was nowhere to be found in D.C today, seeing as how he was busy fighting the scourge of intact ribbons. Sen. Talent has had a long-standing problem with the stem-cell question.In February he removed his co-sponsorship from an anti-cloning bill, a move seen by many as a defense against the growing pro-stem cell movement in Missouri. We'll see how he maneuvers around this week's discussions.
Senate Stem Cell Debate
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The US Senate begins debate today about three stem-cell related bills:
More thoughts later, but I think my favorite moment so far has to be Tom Coburn (R-OK) and Tom Harkin (D-IA) arguing over what cancer is. It's all the better that neither of them have any clue what they're talking about.
July 13, 2006
BME-ball
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Awesome Athletes - School of Engineering & Applied Science - Washington University
Congrats to my alma mater, WashU Biomedical Engineering, and their awe-inspiring softball exploits. As if everyone needed another reason to go BME...
Events: Idea Bounce
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The Skandalaris Center for Entrepreneurial Studies
The Skandalaris Center's summer IdeaBounce is scheduled for next Thursday, July 20th at 5:00pm in May Auditorium at WashU. Advanced registration is free and required.
Doctors = Voldemort
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Tumor wizardry wards off attacks from the immune system
Quote of the year:
"Like the fictional wizard Harry Potter, some cancerous tumors seem capable of wrapping themselves in an invisibility cloak."
SLU Grants
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SLU Medical Center Researchers Receive $6.5 Million in Grants and Contracts | Saint Louis University
Yesterday SLU announced that, In the past year (ish), medical researchers at their school had been awarded $6.5 M in grants. Some selections:
-Development of a robotic ankle prosthetic
-A study of the safety and effectiveness of vaccines in teenagers
-A study of how estrogen affects gene expression
-Structural analyses of proteins involved in cell division
And my favorite:
-A grant of $350 from the March of Dimes to fund a biostatistics study entitled, simply, "Health and Beauty"
In with the new
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A excellent story ran in the Post-Dispatch on Wednesday about some recent tenet shifts at the Center for Emerging Technologies. Before this spring, medical imaging firm Stereotaxis occupied 90% of the CET's available space. With their recent move into CORTEX One on Forest Park Blvd. several new startups have been able to take advantage of the resources at the CET.
This is a great example of the way things are supposed to work. Little company gets big and moves on to larger things. They inspire more entreprenuers, who can then take advantage of the experience of places like the CET and Nidus Center. And the whole thing starts over again.
Two of these new companies are biotech-related. Pepex Biomedical Inc., aquired the name and technology platform of an Alemeda, CA firm focused on biosensors for clinical lactate monitoring. Somark Innovations, founded by 2005 Olin Cup winners Ramos M. Mays and Mark Pydynowski, is developing an injectable radio tag for cattle tracking.
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Somark Innovation founders Ramos M. Mays and Mark Pydynowski, post-cup
July 10, 2006
Stem Cell Documentary
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The Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures - Newsroom
Again on Saturday, the MO Coalition for Lifesaving Cures (MOCLC) announced that they'll be airing a short "documentary" about the upcoming stem cell ballot initiative on broadcast and cable channels throughout Missouri in the weeks to come. The spot features a number of local biotech boosters, including Dr. Bill Danfoth, talking about stem cells in general and the initiative in particular. Being the poilitical spot that it is, you probably won't catch it during prime time, but check out the MOCLC website for your local listings (or just watch it online!)
In the interests of full disclosure, StLBiotech fully endorses the work of the MOCLC and the upcoming ballot initiative.
Spooning
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STLtoday - Business - Story
The Post-Dispatch had an oddly-titled article on Saturday reporting on a visit to Monsanto's Creve Coeur campus by David Spooner, U.S. Department of Commerce Assistant Secretary for Inport Administration.
First off, why don't you just title the thing, "Monsanto needing to contribute to more and more campaign funds" or something? Maybe they had a punny subtitle in the print addition.
Spooner had the usual remarks about the importance of big companies to U.S. exports, jobs, etc. He also gave a shout out to Wash U and both the Danforth and Nidus Centers, but you have to admit that the "My understanding is" quote does sort of make it sound like someone whispered the names to him on the plane.
July 6, 2006
Congrats to Armstrong Teasdale
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Armstrong Teasdale LLP - Armstrong Teasdale Named One of America's Best Corporate Law Firms
Congratulations to Armstrong Teasdale for placing #65 on the Intellectual Property Today Top American Patent Firm list. It's great to see an organization so involved in local technology ventures get some national recognition.