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Artists's depiction of cell assembly line

Cancer-fighting immune cells could soon be engineered inside our bodies

CAR T cells are among the most powerful therapies oncologists have to treat many types of blood cancer. And studies suggest that they might hold promise for brain cancer and other solid tumours, as well as autoimmune and other diseases. One research firm estimates that the value of the CAR-T-therapy market, expected to hit US$11 billion this year, will grow to nearly $190 billion by 2034. But CAR-T therapies come with a serious downside — they are laborious to make and difficult to administer. Some biotechnology companies have an answer: alter T cells inside the body instead...CRISPR–Cas9 pioneer and Nobel prizewinner Jennifer Doudna has co-founded a separate company, Azalea Therapeutics in Berkeley, California, that is developing in vivo CAR T.

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Endometrics

Granatus Ventures Invests in Endometrics to Develop First-in-Kind Solution to Endometriosis

Endometriosis is a chronic condition that affects women causing severe pain and infertility. It affects around 10% of women of reproductive age, diagnosis takes up to 8 years and requires surgery. Endometrics develops a unique solution for diagnosing endometriosis non-invasively by identifying specific genomic features of endometrial cells. Read post
View into the back of an ambulance responding to a call

Coagulant Therapeutics Announces Publication in Blood Advances Describing Novel Nanobody Library to Activated Protein C and Initial Leads for Treatment of Trauma and Hemophilia

By using assays specific for coagulation, inflammation and cell survival functions of APC, the investigators were able to identify an array of human APC specific antibodies able to retain or eliminate these functions. This represents a tool chest for APC targeted therapies that has already identified a lead candidate for the treatment of trauma and hemophilia. Read post
Schematic protein structure

Profluent Announces Launch With $9 Million Seed Round

Profluent is using deep generative models to ‘learn the language of biology’ in order to design new, functional proteins. The goal of protein design is to create novel or enhanced proteins with specific uses. These could include lasting cures for diseases that are free from patent restrictions or new enzymes that can break down unrecyclable plastics. Read post
Don Ganem and Kelly Wong

Tenant Spotlight on Via Nova Therapeutics & Antiviral Development: Seek Out Investors Whose Aims Align With Yours

“Don and I got to talking and we decided, let's try to get these assets out of Novartis and found Via Nova. A little over a year ago, we were able to execute on a Series A, to get an initial funding of $20 million, which also enabled the in-licensing of the assets from Novartis. The four that we chose are for influenza, human rhinovirus, BK polyomavirus and adenovirus.” Two scientists without a team or a lab raised $20 million? You heard right. That funding came from Aditum Bio, an investment firm founded by former Novartis scientists who could appreciate that millions of dollars had already been invested into the R&D for these assets. Read post
Three burgers made with Black Sheep plant-based lamb

Black Sheep Foods Grabs $12.3M to Craft Tastier Plant-Based Meats

Venture capital into the food tech sector has been waning recently. However, by making flavors and also using them, Kumar believes Black Sheep Foods’ new funding is the result of setting the company up for a vertical integration approach that puts it in a unique space done only by Impossible Foods thus far. He adds the new round was planned and follows progress on some of the key things the company has set out to do in 2022, including the rate of product adoption and R&D milestones on its flavors. Read post
A group photo of 5 people at Bakar Labs. CEO Greg Went is far left, with CSO Jack Nguyen to his right.

Tenant Spotlight: Reflexion Pharmaceuticals & The Mirror World of D-Therapeutics

CEO Greg Went appreciates that our time on Earth is short. What he cares about is helping patients with medicines that work. He doesn’t have time for the ego that some scientists have tied up in the technologies they’re developing. He admits that, early on, even his company was too into itself. “What Reflexion lacked early on was the mentality of ‘why develop this technology if it’s not better than monoclonal antibodies.’ ‘Same as’: we don’t need that. We need products that are a factor of two to ten times better than the standard of care.” Read post
A bench along one of BBH's custom angled exterior concrete walls

Retrofitting a Classic – Bakar BioEnginuity Hub

Every aspect of our building is innovative! “What we ended up with was this really cool system of ‘stealth’ looking concrete walls,” Price explains. “They had extreme angles – from 45 degrees to 60 degrees, that were top-cast finished with an EcoSand final finish.” Being large stretches of concrete, there was also concern about skateboarders, so a custom stainless-steel system of skateboard deterrence was designed to replicate the human genome and installed on the face of the battered walls. Read post
Katy Digovich at Bakar Labs

At Minutia, Katy Digovich Is Tackling Diabetes Cell by Cell

But while continuing to work in Africa with the Clinton Health Access Initiative, she learned she couldn't get far enough away. People were surprised when they learned that the nearly 6-foot-tall, athletic-looking Digovich — a former basketball player in college — was living with Type 1 diabetes, a diagnosis in Africa that often translates into stunted growth, amputation and high mortality. "Ultimately, I got really angry and the switch flipped. If I was born there, I would be dead. That really hit close to home," she said. "I took stock of my career and threw myself into the diabetes space." Read post
Photo of the Bakar Labs lobby, skylight, and part of the main office floor

BBH Wins 2022 Preservation Design Award for Rehabilitation

The Bakar BioEnginuity Hub is a winner for the 2022 Preservation Design Award for Rehabilitation. Award recipients are selected by a jury of top professionals in the fields of architecture, engineering, planning, and history, as well as renowned architecture critics and journalists. Read post
Valitor Team

Tenant Spotlight: Valitor Aligns Its Stakeholders to Develop Biopolymer Therapeutics

“Getting the science right is hard enough, but at least I was trained to be a scientist,” says CSO and former CEO Wesley Jackson. “The skill that I had to learn the quickest was to keep all the company’s stakeholders aligned. I naively assumed that if the science was great enough, it would be sufficient to launch the business. But, instead, I found that a company can only exist because there is a team of people who have an interest in it existing." Read post
Valitor CEO Steven Lo (left) and President & CSO Wes Jackson (right)

Valitor Raises $28M Series B to Develop Therapy for Age-Related Macular Degeneration

The company will spend next year testing its multivalent polymer to prep for a clinical trial in 2024. The goal is to create an injectable that can last six months, meaning patients with wet AMD, a chronic eye condition that blurs vision and can sometimes cause blind spots, would only need two injections per year, kind of like going to the dentist, quipped Wesley Jackson, co-founder, president and CSO, in an interview with Endpoints News ahead of the launch. Read post