42

nanotimes

Companies Facts

specific data analysis pipelines for Pipeline Pilot will be offered as the preferred and supported solution for secondary and higher level data analysis for the Oxford Nanopore DNA sequencing system at the time of its commercial release. http://www.nanoporetech.com

P

harmacelsus GmbH, Germany, announced its participation in the 4 year multi-national

research cooperation project “FLUCURE” supported by the European Union with the goal of developing novel, small molecule based therapeutics for re- spiratory diseases caused by influenza viruses. The consortium also joined Vironova AB and Beactica AB (Sweden), Pike Pharma GmbH (Switzerland) and university-based research groups from Italy, Germa- ny, Bulgaria, Lithuania, and the Netherlands. Pharmacelsus will contribute its in vitro ADMET and in vivo pharmacokinetics expertise through sophi- sticated safety tests and by screening several drug candidates for beneficial pharmacological properties. The project started in October 2010 and runs for 4 years with almost EUR6 million in funding provided by the EU. The FLUCURE project aims at developing innovative, first-in-class therapeutics against influenza by targeting its replication machinery. Small mole- cule inhibitors will be designed that interfere with virus-specific protein-protein interactions ultimately avoiding viral replication and spread. A consortium of 10 European partners will bring their expertise together to deliver several drug candidates suitable for clinical development. http://www.pharmacelsus.de

P

hononic Devices closed a $10 million series B investment from Venrock and Oak Investment Partners. Phononic Devices is a private research and

development company that innovates high perfor- mance, environmentally friendly and commercially transforming thermoelectric materials, devices and fully integrated thermal management systems. http://www.phononicdevices.com

P

I introduces a new, more affordable series of Fast Piezo Focusing devices at the 2011 SPIE BIOS

(Biomedical Optics) meeting in San Francisco, CA. The new PIFOC®

system packages are designed to

improve results in fast focussing & lens positioning as well in deconvolution / 3D imaging, and reduce costs at the same time. The PIFOC®

piezo objective

scanner system packages consist of closed-loop pie- zomechanic objective positioners and custom-tuned compact ditigal servo controller / driver units. This combination provides higher performance at reduced costs. The integrated, frictionless and high-stiffness piezo flexure drive ensures fast response and short settling times, as well as exceptional guiding accu- racy. The settling time of less than 10ms increases throughput and allows for rapid Z-stack acquisition. http://www.physikinstrumente.com/en/literature_RFQ/ index.php

P the UNIarray®

rotagen AG, a specialist in in-vitro diagnostics and GMP-compliant protein analysis, will be using Platform to help discover biomarkers

in relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis for Biogen Idec, Inc. Under the terms of the agreement, Pro- tagen will apply its UNIarray®

technology platform

and expertise in autoantibody research to support retrospective analysis of samples from a Biogen Idec clinical trial for the purpose of finding predictive and response biomarkers associated with multiple sclero- sis (MS) therapy. http://www.protagen.de

11-02/03 :: February / March 2011