454 Life Sciences (Branford) said that researchers at San Diego State University recently used metagenomic analysis with the company's Genome Sequencer System to sequence coral samples under varying environmental stressors. The purpose of the study, led by Dr. Forest Rohwer, was to replicate current ecological changes in tropical reef habitats such as reduced pH, elevated nutrients, and increased temperatures, in order to determine their effects on viral populations within the coral.

Achillion Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (New Haven) named Joseph Truitt as Vice President of Business Development and Chief Commercial Officer. Mr. Truitt, who joins Achillion from ViroPharma, Inc. which recently acquired Lev Pharmaceuticals, Inc., will be responsible for identifying, evaluating and executing corporate partnerships, strategic initiatives and new product opportunities.

Alexion Pharmaceuticals (Cheshire) announced that Canada's national healthcare regulatory agency, Health Canada, has approved the use of Soliris® (eculizumab) for the treatment of all patients in Canada with paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria (PNH), a rare, debilitating and life-threatening blood disorder defined by chronic red blood cell destruction, or hemolysis. Soliris is the first therapy approved in Canada for the treatment of PNH.

Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (New York/Wallingford) announced strong fourth quarter sales and earnings growth completing an "excellent" overall 2008 financial performance. "We are reaching our objectives in all areas," said James M. Cornelius, chairman and CEO.

Cara Therapeutics (Shelton) announced that it is initiating a Phase 2 clinical trial of its long-acting peripheral kappa opioid agonist, CR845. The Phase 2 multi-center, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial will be conducted in the United States and will evaluate the analgesic efficacy and safety of intravenous CR845 during the post-operative period in women following laparoscopic-assisted hysterectomy. The trial is expected to enroll 120 patients, who will be randomly selected for treatment with one of two doses of CR845 or placebo. Results from the study are expected in the second half of 2009.

CellDesign Inc. (New Haven) has a new website at <http://www.celldesign.com/>. The company is dedicated to advancing drug discovery and basic research by providing stem cell-based model systems for a wide variety of cell types and applications.

Connecticut Innovations (Rocky Hill) made an additional investment of $200,000 in FMP Products Inc. With operations in Greenwich and New Milford, FMP is developing laboratory automation equipment and software to help improve the productivity of researchers in the pharmaceutical, industrial, educational, and governmental arenas.

In a recent statement, Timothy M. Shannon, President and CEO of CuraGen Corporation (Branford), said: "We currently have $88 million of cash and investments on hand and an attractive Phase II development asset that shows activity in metastatic melanoma and promise in breast cancer. We are encouraged by the activity CR011-vcMMAE has demonstrated to date and we will be releasing additional data on our two ongoing trials in the second quarter of 2009."

Danbury Hospital (Danbury) is the only hospital in Connecticut and one of only 114 hospitals in the nation to receive HealthGrades Distinguished Hospital for Clinical Excellence Award™ for the fifth consecutive year. This distinction is based on an independent study released today by HealthGrades, the leading healthcare ratings company.

GlaxoSmithKline (Research Triangle Park, NC) and Idenix Pharmaceuticals announced the execution of a license agreement granting GSK exclusive worldwide rights to IDX899.  IDX899 is a novel non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor (NNRTI) in Phase II clinical development being developed by Idenix for the treatment of HIV/AIDS.

Hartford Hospital (Hartford) has implemented a new system that reduces time during the most critical period of a heart attack. Under the system, paramedics can now administer an electrocardiogram (EKG) when arriving at the site of the patient. EKG results are immediately and securely transmitted to the hospital prior to the patient’s arrival, ensuring doctors are briefed on and prepared for the patient’s emergency.

HistoRx (New Haven) has appointed Kathleen Q. Adams to the newly created position of Vice President, Diagnostics Marketing. Ms. Adams brings to HistoRx 20 years of marketing experience in the diagnostics and pharmaceuticals industries. Before joining HistoRx, she was Marketing Director of New Technology Planning & Research for Quest Diagnostics.

Ipsogen (Marseille, France/New Haven) has appointed Hélène Peyro-Saint-Paul chief medical officer. Prior to joining Ipsogen, she was European Neuro‐Psychiatry Medical Lead at Bristol‐Myers Squibb.

Johnson & Johnson (New Brunswick, NJ) said that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted marketing approval to the NaviStar® ThermoCool® Catheter for the treatment of drug refractory recurrent symptomatic paroxysmal atrial fibrillation, when used with compatible three-dimensional electroanatomic mapping systems. Atrial fibrillation, or AFib, is a highly prevalent heart rhythm disorder and one of the most common causes of stroke.

Neurogen Corporation (Branford) entered into a definitive agreement to sell its C5a patent estate and related assets to a major pharmaceutical company for $2.25 million. Neurogen's C5a patent estate and related assets were generated as part of an effort to discover new drugs for the treatment of inflammatory disorders. Proceeds from the sale are expected to be received in the first quarter of 2009.

Pfizer Inc. (New York, NY/Groton/New London) and Wyeth announced that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement under which Pfizer will acquire Wyeth in a cash-and-stock transaction.

Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) (Washington, DC) said it supports development of high quality comparative clinical effectiveness research as an important tool for meeting health care challenges. "CER can be a useful tool for improving patient outcomes and medical decision-making," the association said.

Emergent BioSolutions announced it has ended all activities related to its planned acquisition of Protein Sciences Corporation (Meriden).

Rib-X Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (New Haven) announced that it had closed on a $25 million financing, which will fund the ongoing development of its pipeline of novel antibiotics.  This round included participation from all of Rib-X’s major investors, including: Warburg Pincus, ABS Ventures, Axiom Ventures, EuclidSR Partners, MedImmune Ventures, Oxford Bioscience Partners, S.R. One, and Vox Equity Partners I.

WinStanley Enterprises, LLC (Concord, MA/New Haven) has purchased the former U.S. Repeating Arms Co. factory in Science Park located in New Haven's  Newhallville neighborhood. Earlier Winstanley purchased 25 Science Park and has begun construction on a mixed-use retail, commercial, and parking facility across the street on Winchester Avenue. Winstanley Enterprises now owns and operates one million square feet of commercial space in New Haven.

Following is recent news from The University of Connecticut (Storrs) and the University of Connecticut Health Center (Farmington).

UConn researchers have created two new human embryonic stem cell lines and are making the lines available to academic researchers to study the therapeutic potential of the cells. more

A new report from UConn and the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development, "UConnomy," outlines the university's role in the state'seconomy. Part of the report discusses research and innovation. It says faculty members from across the University, including the Health Center, are engaged in cutting-edge research projects aimed at transforming the lives of citizens – now and into the future: “Their work brings about the knowledge and innovations that will ultimately foster business development, an enhanced quality of life, improved education, and stronger economic growth in Connecticut and beyond.” more

Stem Cell expert Xiangzhong "Jerry'' Yang, who escaped the poverty of rural China to become one of the top cloning scientists in the world, has died. Yang provided critical insights that put UConn squarely on the frontier of science while laying the groundwork for cooperative research efforts between scientists in the United States and his native China.

Research by a UConn neurobiologist has demonstrated that a developmental brain disorder that causes a predisposition to seizures can be reversed. The research, by a team led by Joseph LoTurco, a professor of physiology and neurobiology in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, was the cover article in the January issue of the biomedical research journal Nature Medicine. more

David Butler, a recent graduate of the School of Pharmacy’s neurosciences doctoral program in pharmacology and toxicology, is one of five researchers in the country to be recognized as an outstanding young investigator by the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation. more

A urologist at the Health Center has landed a five-year, $729,000 grant from the American Cancer Society to study the role of inflammatory molecules on the development and progression of bladder cancer. Urology researcher Dr. John A. Taylor III, an assistant professor of surgery at the UConn School of Medicine, says he is particularly pleased to receive the grant at a time when funding for cancer research is harder to come by, especially for those studying bladder cancer. more

Xudong Yao, an assistant professor of chemistry in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, is being honored by Genome Technology magazine as one of the world’s 30 top young investigators in the field of genomics and related sciences. Yao, 43, was selected for innovative use of mass spectrometry in studying proteins associated with cystic fibrosis and cellular signal communication. more

Debra A. Kendall, Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of Molecular and Cell Biology and associate dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, has been elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Kendall’s research focuses on cellular activities that take place at the cell membrane, an area of study that has grown rapidly in the past decade, as scientists learn how information is transmitted from outside to inside the cell. That information can determine how drugs and therapeutic treatments are designed. more

Following is recent news from Yale University and the Yale School of Medicine (New Haven).

In a finding that could lead to improved treatment of chronic inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), Yale University researchers have uncovered a key mechanism in the immune system that appears to offer protection from the disorder. The Yale team, led by Richard A. Flavell, chair of the Department of Immunobiology, found that the cytokine interleukin-22 (IL-22), which can damage tissue in diseases such as psoriasis, actually seems to play a protective role in the case of inflammatory bowel disease.

Breaking new ground in what many surgeons consider the next frontier in minimally invasive surgery, Yale School of Medicine and Yale-New Haven Hospital surgeon Kurt Roberts, M.D., successfully performed an appendectomy with no abdominal incision. The appendix was removed through a small incision in the patient's vagina.

Yale engineers have created a process that may revolutionize the manufacture of nano-devices from computer memory to biomedical sensors by exploiting a novel type of metal called "bulk metallic glass." The material can be molded like plastics to create features at the nano-scale and yet is more durable and stronger than silicon or steel. The work is reported in the February 12 issue of Nature. Senior author is Jan Schroers of the Yale School of Engineering & Applied Science.

In a paper published online in the journal Genes and Development, Yale University researchers describe how they used a new technology to track fundamental biological processes. "We’ve never been able to do that before in anything like this detail," said Michael Snyder, the Lewis B. Cullman professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology and professor of molecular biophysics and biochemistry and senior co-author of the study.

In a study appearing in the journal Molecular Cell, a team led by Michael Simons, M.D., chief of cardiology at Yale School of Medicine, showed that a protein called syndecan-4 appears to activate mTORC2, one of two key mTOR protein complexes.  Once mTORC2 is activated, it regulates a critical molecular pathway governed by an enzyme called Akt, which in turn controls the size, proliferation and survival of cells.

Yale researchers used newly developed mathematical models to analyze huge amounts of data on physical characteristics such as temperature and salinity in different ocean habitats and metabolic activity in marine micro-organisms. The research team was headed by computational biology and bioinformatics Ph.D. student Tara A. Gianoulis under the laboratories of Gerstein and Michael Snyder, the Lewis B. Cullman professor of molecular, cellular & developmental biology and professor of molecular biophysics & biochemistry.

The risk of HIV infection in high-risk populations may be substantially reduced by an antiretroviral drug treatment currently being tested in clinical trials, according to a study led by a researcher at the Yale School of Public Health. A. David Paltiel, a professor in the division of Health Policy Administration, is the study’s lead author.

Simple aspirin may prevent liver damage in millions of people suffering from side effects of common drugs, alcohol abuse, and obesity-related liver disease, a new Yale University study suggests. Aspirin may help prevent and treat liver damage from a host of non-infectious causes, said Wajahat Mehal, M.D., of the Section of Digestive Diseases and Department of Immunobiology at Yale School of Medicine.

Yale researchers have published a cellular atlas of genetic activity in rice, documenting with unprecedented detail how and when genes are turned off and on within cells of a living organism. "All crops will benefit from knowledge and tools derived from the rice atlas," said Timothy Nelson, professor of molecular, cellular & developmental biology and senior author of the study.

Yale School of Medicine researchers have identified proteins associated with early onset neonatal sepsis (EONS), a stealthy bacterial infection linked to premature birth, illness and death. "The biomarkers we identified have diagnostic value for infection and inflammation," said Yale assistant professor Catalin Buhimschi, M.D., senior investigator on the study.

Three billion years ago, a "new" amino acid was added to the alphabet of 20 that commonly make up proteins in organisms today. Now researchers at Yale and the University of Tokyo have demonstrated how this rare amino acid — and, by example, other amino acids — made its way into the menu for protein synthesis. Among the investigators were Yale postdoctoral fellow and lead co-author Patrick O’Donoghue and principal investigator Dieter Söll, Sterling Professor of Molecular Biophysics & Biochemistry and professor of chemistry at Yale.

Clues to the cause of preeclampsia, a common, but serious hypertension complication of pregnancy that has puzzled doctors and researchers for decades, point to proteins that misfold and aggregate, according to Yale School of Medicine researchers. "Results support the hypothesis that preeclampsia is a pregnancy-specific protein misfolding disease," said lead author on the abstract, Irina Buhimschi, M.D., associate professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences.

Chronic hypertension, diabetes and blood clots are more likely in otherwise healthy women who experienced complications due to hypertension such as preeclampsia in their first pregnancies, according to Yale School of Medicine researchers working in collaboration with the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. "The only reliable treatment for preeclampsia is delivery of the baby," said senior author Michael J. Paidas, M.D., associate professor and director of the Program for Thrombosis and Hemostasis in Women’s Health in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences at Yale. "But while delivery may 'cure' preeclampsia in the moment, these mothers are at high risk of chronic hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus and blood clots for the rest of their lives."

Sequential hermaphroditism naturally occurs in various organisms from plants to fishes. Following four decades of research that established why sex change is advantageous, the question remained why it is rare among animals. In a study, Yale graduate student Erem Kazancıoğlu and his advisor Suzanne Alonzo, assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, demonstrate that sex change is surprisingly robust against costs.

A missing link in the evolution of the front claw of living scorpions and horseshoe crabs was identified with the discovery of a 390 million-year-old fossil by researchers at Yale and the University of Bonn, Germany. "With a head like the giant Cambrian aquatic predator Anomalocaris and a body like a modern arthropod, the specimen is the only known example of this unusual creature," said Derek Briggs, director of Yale’s Peabody Museum of Natural History and an author of the paper appearing in the journal Science.

Jeremy Gray, a psychologist at Yale University, is one of 20 young scientists who are winners of the Presidential Early Career Awards for Science and Engineers. The awards, given by the White House in consultation with the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, recognize young researchers who, early in their careers, demonstrate exceptional leadership at the frontiers of knowledge.

The public’s concerns about costs and increased promiscuity among teenagers appear to be hindering use of a vaccine against the human papilloma virus (HPV) to prevent life-threatening diseases, according to a study by researchers at Yale School of Public Health. The Yale researchers—Sanjay Basu, a Ph.D. candidate, and Alison Galvani, assistant professor in the Division of Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases— studied how concerns about adolescent promiscuity and everyday economics lead many parents and guardians to not have their children treated.

Researchers at the Yale University AIDS Program will study HIV prevention and drug treatment in soon-to-be released prisoners in Connecticut and Malaysia with funding from federal grants totaling $6.4 million. "Successful programs are urgently needed to break the cycle of chemical dependence and incarceration," said principal investigator of the two grants, Frederick L. Altice, M.D., professor of medicine at the Yale School of Medicine.

Many physicians fail to use readily available interpreters with their non-English speaking patients, opting for "getting by" with their own limited foreign language skills or using a patient’s friend or family member, according to research conducted in part by the Yale School of Public Health. "The study shows that there will be no easy fix, but clearly this is an important and widespread problem," said Elizabeth Bradley, professor of public health who co-authored the study with Yale research scientist Leslie Curry.

In a boost to their efforts to improve ovarian cancer detection and find a cure for the disease, Yale School of Medicine researchers Gil Mor, M.D., and Alessandro Santin, M.D., have won over $5 million in federal and foundation grants.

A team of Yale University researchers has found that school-based programs for obesity prevention and reversal are generally effective and are an important component in battling what many regard as a national obesity epidemic among young people. "Our paper shows that schools can, indeed, be part of the solution—and therefore should be because the only alternative is to be part of the problem," said David L. Katz, M.D., adjunct associate professor at Yale School of Public Health and director of Yale’s Prevention Research Center. Katz was lead investigator of the study appearing in a recent issue of International Journal of Obesity.

Older adults with poor health habits appear to be much more likely to quit smoking or lose weight following a serious health diagnosis, a Yale School of Public Health researcher has found. "A serious diagnosis can serve as a trigger to motivate older adults to make difficult health behavior changes," said Patricia S. Keenan, an assistant professor in the division of Health Policy and Administration.

People dealing with the daily stress of a high-pressure career can adversely affect the mental health of their spouses, new research conducted by the Yale School of Public Health has found. "Much previous research has shown that spouses have similar mental health characteristics, but my paper demonstrates that work-related stress can ripple through the family," said Jason M. Fletcher, an assistant professor in the division of Health Policy and Administration.

For more member news, see the Jan/Feb 2009 issue of CURE News