With a budget bill passed this weekend and the University System of Maryland successfully lobbying for limited cuts to its state funding, the final day of the state’s legislative session was less intense for the higher education lobby.

The most significant bills for this university and the university system received support in both chambers of the legislature and passed with little controversy.

But for what amounted to a quiet day, the university system secured significant victories, with measures that use university resources to spur economic development and a state grant program aimed at attracting talented faculty to state universities passing one right after the other on the morning of sine die.

A less-invasive brain diagnostic test, a surface so slippery bacteria can’t stick to it, and a low-cost mylar wrap to help warm babies’ heads after surgery were three of the projects on display at Boston Children’s Hospital’s first-ever Innovators Showcase Friday.

The event is part of a larger push by Chief Innovation Officer Naomi Fried’s office to seek out innovators across the organization, support them with advice and sometimes money, and help guide them towards commercialization.

A group of University of Maryland undergraduates put together a spectacular hackathon this weekend, attracting more than 750 college students from across the country to take part in the 36-hour long event. The hackathon, which went by the name of Bitcamp, lasted from April 4-6 in Cole Field House on school grounds, providing students with the opportunity to collaborate with fellow innovators in creating brilliant new hardware and applications for mobile devices, computers or the Web. 

Health technology is advancing so rapidly that within a decade the small handheld medical reader used by Dr. Leonard McCoy in Star Trek — the tricorder — will look primitive.

We are moving into an era of data-driven, crowdsourced, participatory, genomics-based medicine. Just as our bathroom scales give us instant readings of our weight, wearable devices will monitor our health and warn us when we are about to get sick. Our doctors — or their artificial intelligence replacements — will prescribe medicines or lifestyle changes based on our full medical history, holistic self, and genetic composition.

After seeing how the federal agencies intend to implement the recommendations from The White House Lab to Market Summit the difference between product and process oriented people really hit home.

Product people burn with a passion to get the job done. Process people focus on rules and procedures to minimize risk.  Thus, product people are like the accelerator and process people are the brakes.  You need both in your car, but if the brakes run the show you’ll never get out of the driveway.  Similarly, whenever deal makers are subservient in a system to process people, frustration is sure to follow.

A blood sample could one day be enough to diagnose many types of solid cancers, or to monitor the amount of cancer in a patient’s body and responses to treatment. Previous versions of the approach, which relies on monitoring levels of tumor DNA circulating in the blood, have required cumbersome and time-consuming steps to customize it to each patient or have not been sufficiently sensitive.

Now, researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have devised a way to quickly bring the technique to the clinic. Their approach, which should be broadly applicable to many types of cancers, is highly sensitive and specific. With it they were able to accurately identify about 50 percent of people in the study with stage-1 lung cancer and all patients whose cancers were more advanced.

Alios BioPharma, Inc., a biotechnology company developing proprietary therapeutics for respiratory viral diseases, today announced it has completed a $41 Million Series B financing. All existing investors -- Novo Ventures, SR One, Roche Venture Fund and Novartis Ventures -- participated in this round, which was led by a new, undisclosed investor.

"We are pleased to welcome our newest investor and to have the continued support from our current investors for this round of financing," stated Lawrence M. Blatt, PhD, President and Chief Executive Officer of Alios BioPharma. "This funding will allow Alios to retain ownership and control of our novel, first-in-class anti-respiratory virus development programs."

Rockville-based malaria vaccine development company Sanaria Inc. won the 2014 Vaccine Industry Excellence (VIE) Award for the “Best Prophylactic Vaccine” presented last week during the 14th World Vaccine Congress.

The Sanaria® PfSPZ Vaccine demonstrated complete protection against malaria in all volunteers (6/6) who received high dose immunizations in a trial at the Vaccine Research Center (VRC), National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), NIH.

Funding and Research Opportunities

The following funding opportunity announcements from the NHLBI or other components of the National Institutes of Health, might be of interest:

NIH Guide Notices:

• NOT-HD-14-011: Notice of NICHD's Participation in RFA-HG-14-020 "Development of Software and Analysis Methods for
• NOT-HL-14-219: Request for Information (RFI): Opportunities to Advance Clinical Research in Congenital and Pediatric
• NOT-HL-14-220: Notice of National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) Participation in RFA-HG-14-020 "Development
• NOT-OD-14-073: Maintaining Confidentiality in NIH Peer Review
• NOT-OD-14-072: Notice of Extension of Eligibility for PA-14-150 "Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (NRSA) Individual Predoctoral MD/PhD or Other Dual-Doctoral Degree Fellowship (Parent F30)" [Posted 03/21/2014]
• NOT-OD-14-069: NIH Policy for Managing Conflict of Interest in the Peer Review of Concepts and Proposals for Research and Development Contract Projects [Posted 03/21/2014]  

Please note that most links to RFAs, PAs, and Guide Notices will take you to the NIH Web site. RFPs will take you to FedBizOpps. Links to RFPs will not work past their proposal receipt date. Archived versions of RFPs posted on FedBizOpps can be found on the FedBizOpps site using the FedBizOpps search function. Under “Document to Search,” select Archived Documents.

GlycoMimetics, Inc. announced the addition of Timothy Pearson to its Board of Directors.

According to a release, Pearson most recently held the position of Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President and Treasurer at Catalyst Health Solutions, a publicly held pharmacy benefit manager with over $5 billion in revenues. Pearson led the company's financial activities, including performance management, investor relations, SEC compliance, capital strategy and planning, until SXC Health Solutions (now Catamaran Corp.) acquired Catalyst in 2012. Pearson had previously served as Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President of MedImmune, the global biologics business for AstraZeneca PLC, where he had functional responsibility for finance, information technology, strategic planning and governance, and was a member of MedImmune's Executive Team.

Leaving home: My father was a Chinese diplomat, posted in Peru. After Mao’s revolution, my parents opened a grocery store in Lima. They worked seven days a week, and we lived in the back. When I was 15, my parents sent me to America with $300. “Make a life for yourself,” they said.

Making the grade: In my first year at college in Iowa, I was learning a new language, attending school, and working 25 hours a week. When I got a C-minus, I told my professor Paul Uhlinger I wanted to return to Peru. He said, “Never let where you come from determine where you will go.” He had more confidence in me than I had in myself.

At Medgadget we love artificial organs, from kidneys to hearts to skin. The pancreas is no exception. We recently had the opportunity to speak with Medtronic Diabetes’ Chief Medical Officer and VP of Global, Clinical, and Health Affairs, Dr. Francine Kaufman, about the most recent step that Medtronic has taken towards developing a fully-functional artificial pancreas.

Shiv Gaglani, Medgadget: Can you describe how the artificial pancreas works?

Dr. Francine Kaufman: A fully automated “artificial pancreas” is a system that closely mimics the insulin delivery of a working pancreas using advanced technology that continuously monitors glucose levels and automatically adjusts insulin delivery with minimal or no patient interaction.

The IPO market for venture-backed companies is off to a much stronger start than last year, which didn’t really get going until the second quarter.

Castlight Health officials celebrate the company’s IPO at the New York Stock Exchange on March 14. Reuters There were 36 initial public offerings in the first three months of this year compared with eight a year ago, according to data from Thomson Reuters and the National Venture Capital Association. It was the strongest quarter for IPOs since the third quarter of 2000.

GlycoMimetics, Inc. announced today the addition of Timothy Pearson to its Board of Directors. Mr. Pearson most recently held the position of Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President and Treasurer at Catalyst Health Solutions, a publicly held pharmacy benefit manager with over $5 billion in revenues. Mr. Pearson led the company's financial activities, including performance management, investor relations, SEC compliance, capital strategy and planning, until SXC Health Solutions (now Catamaran Corporation) acquired Catalyst in 2012. Mr. Pearson had previously served as Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President of MedImmune, the global biologics business for AstraZeneca PLC, where he had functional responsibility for finance, information technology, strategic planning and governance, and was a member of MedImmune's Executive Team.

"Having completed our initial public offering in early 2014, it's ideal for us to now be adding an experienced public company CFO to our Board roster," said Rachel King, CEO of GlycoMimetics. "The addition of Tim to our Board of Directors comes at the perfect time for our company given his financial experience at MedImmune and Catalyst Health Solutions."

Researchers at the Institute for Genome Sciences at the University of Maryland School of Medicine have been awarded a research program contract from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to sequence, assemble, and annotate a population of bacterial pathogens using two high-throughput sequencing (HTS) technologies in support of the expansion of a vetted public reference database.

The continued development of HTS technologies for accurate identification of microorganisms for diagnostic use will have significant impact on human healthcare, biothreat response, food safety, and other areas. Developing a comprehensive, curated database of microbial genome sequences and associated metadata will serve as a valuable reference to evaluate and assess HTS-based diagnostic devices. Leading the sequencing and analysis phases of the project, the Genomics Resource Center (GRC) at the Institute is a cutting-edge genomic sequencing and analysis center with a long history of high-quality microbial genomics research that has sequenced and analyzed more than 5,000 microbial genome sequences in just the past five years.

The Tech Council of Maryland (TCM), Maryland’s largest technology trade association for life science and technology, today announced the finalists for its 26th Annual Industry Awards. Winners will be revealed at a celebration on May 15 at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center.

“Our annual celebration is a phenomenal event, where our community can come together to recognize individuals and companies in the technology and life science industries that drive our state’s economy,” said Phil Schiff, TCM’s CEO. “Our finalists exemplify the spirit that propels innovation and makes Maryland a leader in tech sector nationwide.”

The National Security Agency (NSA) and University of Maryland-Baltimore County (UMBC) have announced a partnership to establish one of the first university-level hacking education and research programs in the United States.

The $750 million grant is the largest the university has ever received, and the amount dwarfs the $148.2 million total combined in extramural and federal funding received in 2013.

Seeking a university partner to cultivate their new education and research programs, the NSA has chosen UMBC after a competitive selection process. Along with developing new tools to secure the country’s cyberspace of the future, the programs are designed to train and round up armies of world-class hacking talent.

At this year’s BIO CEO and Investor Conference in New York, I had the opportunity to meet Annalisa Jenkins, EVP and head of global R&D, Merck Serono. Jenkins has been busy working on a game-changing, singlesource CRO collaboration model with Quintiles. Understanding how and why she did it first requires insight into the leadership approach of her risk-enabling CEO, Belén Garijo (see page 24), followed by Jenkins’ detailed explanation of creating the model, along with some pretty good advice on building game-changing collaborations (see page 30). Finalizing this collaboration model won’t make her schedule any less busy; in fact, it just got busier.

On the day of our meeting, the Healthcare Businesswomen's Association (HBA) publicized Jenkins as a 2014 Woman Of The Year (WOTY). Just two weeks later, TransCelerate BioPharma announced Jenkins as the new chairwoman of its board of directors. When you combine her positions with TransCelerate and HBA along with her advisory roles with the Center for Talent Innovation (CTI) and PhRMA, you get a sense for her willingness to engage outside her own company. This is a pivotal first step toward embracing one of our industry's major trends — the new innovation ecosystem, which is where Jenkins anticipates the next wave of life sciences industry R&D innovations will come from. She is not alone in her opinion.

A Charlottesville startup based on technology licensed from the University of Virginia has received major funding to develop unique wireless devices.

PsiKick designs ultra-low power wireless chips that use harvested energy. The series of financing will allow the company to hire more staff, expand their engineering team, and produce more chips to take out to potential customers.

The first application the team wants to enable is wearable computing.

PsiKick, a company headquartered in Charlottesville and based on technology licensed from the University of Virginia, University of Michigan and University of Washington, announced a major financing milestone led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Osage University Partners and MINTS, a venture fund of the University of Michigan. This funding round will enable PsiKick to accelerate the development of the groundbreaking Ultra-Low-Power wireless sensing devices.

These devices, the so-called systems-on-chip or SoC, are circuits capable of integrating all components of an electric system in one small chip. PsiKick’s Ultra-Low Power Wireless SoCs are operating at a fraction of the power capacity of other energy efficient circuit platforms. In fact, these devices function at such extreme energy efficiency that they are able to continuously and entirely be powered by harvested energy sources such as vibration, thermal gradients, solar power and radio frequency.

Take advantage of this unparalleled opportunity to spotlight your company in front of thousands of potential partners from around the world.

Are you an innovative biotech company that is R&D-intensive and is developing strategic partnerships within the industry? Nominate your company to be the Buzz of BIO!
Winners receive complimentary registration, a Company Presentation in the Business Forum and promotion by the Convention to industry leaders.

Act fast! Nominations are only open until April 8th 5pm ET

The idea that you can develop a concept for a company and launch it within 48 hours is at the heart of Startup Weekend. When you add healthcare to the mix it becomes a lot more challenging but no less interesting. Philadelphia hosted its third Startup Weekend for healthcare at Venturef0rth over the weekend.

Elliot Menschik, who was one of the judges to review the 12 team pitches, heads up shared workspace Venturef0rth and is a managing partner for healthcare with DreamIt Health, DreamIt Ventures’ health IT accelerator. He said it’s the longest running StartUp Weekend for healthcare in the country. About 14 cities have since hosted their own version of the event. Duke University is planning to host one in August.

Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "The Worldwide Market for Molecular Diagnostics - 6-Month Update" report to their offering.

Molecular diagnostics is becoming a dominant platform in clinical medicine and represents one of the fastest-growing segments of the diagnostics market.

Many molecular tests are CE Marked and FDA-cleared and many more are in development. However many more unique tests have been launched as test services, especially for cancer management and infectious disease epidemiology.

Next E-Team Stage 1 Deadline: May 9, 2014

Click here to view our most recently funded E-Teams.

The E-Team Program provides early-stage support and funding of up to $75,000 for collegiate entrepreneurs working on market-based technology inventions.

Since 1995, our E-Team grants have been funding collegiate student and student/faculty teams to move ideas out of the lab and classroom and into the marketplace. The program enhances this opportunity by providing expert entrepreneurial and venture coaching, experiential workshops, and a potential investment opportunity to help realize the commercial success of the technology inventions and innovations that come through our organization.

Selected E-Team Program participants may also be invited to exhibit their technologies at Open Minds, the annual showcase of breakthrough technologies from NCIIA's top student teams. The 2014 Open Minds exhibition will be held in San Jose, CA, March 21-22 during NCIIA's annual conference, OPEN.

Tech Council of MD presents a Bioscience Networking Reception April 3 from 6:00-8:00 p.m. with Christopher P. Austin, M.D., Director, National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences.

Don't miss this enhanced networking reception with leaders from the Mid-Atlantic region's life science community followed by a brief overview of the National Center for Advancing Translational Science (NCATS) from Dr. Christopher Austin. Learn about NCATS' goals and plans to collaborate with the local life science community.

How could this be: A 100-year-old government consulting firm that's always taken its marching orders from Uncle Sam, investing its own money in the big ideas of the underfunded?

It actually makes perfect sense, said Karen Dahut, Booz Allen's executive vice president who leads the company's strategic innovation group. And it's just one possibility that might come of the company's partnership with downtown technology startup hub 1776 announced Monday.

Earlier this month, President Obama announced his 2015 budget, a roadmap for accelerating economic growth, expanding opportunity for all Americans and ensuring fiscal responsibility. The budget supports the President’s Management Agenda to deliver a 21st century government that is more effective, efficient, and supportive of economic growth. One key element of the President’s Management Agenda is accelerating the transfer of Federally funded research from the laboratory to the commercial marketplace – a “Lab-to-Market” agenda.

The Federal Government spends more than $130 billion on research and development (R&D) each year, conducted primarily at universities and Federal laboratories.  This investment supports fundamental research that expands the frontiers of human knowledge, and yields extraordinary long-term economic impact through the creation of new knowledge and ultimately new industries – often in unexpected ways.

In the latest test of 3D printing in orthopedic surgery, neurosurgeons in The Netherlands announced that they successfully implanted a 3D printer skull to treat a 22-year old woman suffering from a bone disorder.

The procedure, carried out by surgeons at University Medical Center Utrecht, was carried out three months ago but was only disclosed after ensuring that the implant wasn’t rejected and the patient made a full recovery. Australian company Anatomics produced the 3-D skull implant.

San Francisco’s SoMa neighborhood; Cambridge, Massachusetts’ Kendall Square; Lower Manhattan: These are the dense, walkable neighborhoods that have become the new hubs of America’s tech scene, as the center of gravity for venture investment and start-up activity shifts from suburbs to urban centers.

This urban shift in America’s venture capital-fueled innovation economy is detailed in my latest report from the Martin Prosperity Institute, released today at The Atlantic’s Start-Up City: Miami event. (The report builds upon and deepens the analysis developed initially in my Start-Up City series here on the site last year).

Reading the cover story of last week’s Capital Business (“Educating tomorrow’s entrepreneurs”) echoed what I had seen at the recent South by Southwest Edu conference, where I took part in a panel called “Student Startups: The Ultimate Educational Experience.”

I was intrigued when I realized the audience for the panel was nearly 75 percent K-12 educators — not the higher ed audience I and the other panelists were expecting. Maybe I shouldn’t have been so surprised. The piqued interest for primary and secondary educators is exciting and encouraging, especially from where I sit.

The University of Maryland kicked off today its third annual 30 Days of EnTERPreneurship, a month-long celebration of the university's fearless ideas, innovation and impact.

"The University of Maryland has long been a pioneer in entrepreneurship and a leader in research and academic innovation.  And in recent years, the university has put even greater, campus-wide emphasis on preparing faculty, students and staff to tackle the world's toughest problems through innovation and entrepreneurship. Our '30 Days of EnTERPreneurship' highlights and celebrates that commitment across all schools," says Dean Chang, UMD's associate vice president for innovation and entrepreneurship.

Cardiovascular disease accounts for 52% of female deaths and 42% of male deaths in the EU. Approximately four million people in Europe and 1.9 million people in the EU die of cardiovascular disease each year, according to the European Society of Cardiology. Cardiovascular disease and strokes are usually caused by high levels of bad cholesterol, high blood pressure, obesity, unhealthy diet and physical inactivity.

The European Society for Cardiology (ESC) and the European Heart Network (EHN) estimate the cost to the EU economy at over €196 billion per year, with healthcare expenditure varying from 4% in Luxembourg to 17% in Estonia, Latvia and Poland.

RuiYi, Inc. announced today a $15 million Series B financing by existing investors: 5AM Ventures, Versant Ventures, Apposite Capital, SR One, the independent corporate healthcare venture capital fund of GlaxoSmithKline, Merck Serono Ventures, the strategic corporate venture fund of Merck Serono, and Aravis SA. RuiYi has a pipeline of innovative monoclonal antibodies to previously untargeted G protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) for important global, therapeutic needs. The financing will support the continued development of RuiYi's lead asset, RYI-008, a novel anti-IL-6 monoclonal antibody (mAb), and the discovery and development of new therapeutic mAbs targeting GPCRs, including a first-in-class mAb to cannabinoid receptor 1 (CB-1), a commercially validated but previously intractable drug target. In addition, RuiYi expanded the leadership team, appointing Erik Karrer, Ph.D. as chief scientific officer and Brian Campion, Ph.D. as vice president of business development. 

Doctors and Life Science Professionals: Invest in what you know!

Wednesday, April 9, 2014 from 6:00 PM to 8:30 PM

The original idea for the subtitle of this meeting was “doctors don’t have to be bad investors!” Doctors have the resources to invest, but often lack the time or expertise needed to evaluate investment opportunities.

However, with healthcare now the fastest growing sector of the economy, physicians are uniquely positioned to use their knowledge to invest wisely and achieve great returns.  Additionally, with all the recent SEC changes, new approaches to investing, such as crowd equity, bring opportunities to take part in investing like never before. Therefore, for doctors, it starts with investing in what you know!

The National Science Foundation (NSF) announced a new round of funding for the Innovation Corps Sites (I-Corps Sites) Program.  Housed at institutions of higher education, I-Corps Sites are intended to:

• Nurture students and/or faculty who are engaged in NSF-funded research projects with commercial potential;
• Provide infrastructure, advice, resources, networking opportunities, training and funding to enable groups to transition their scientific and engineering discoveries into the marketplace or into becoming I-Corps Team applicants;
• Support and mentor I-Corps Teams; and,
• Develop formal, active, local innovation ecosystems that contribute to a larger, national network of mentors, researchers, entrepreneurs and investors.