Accolades

ADial PharmaceuticalsTM LLC and Tau Therapeutics LLC were named finalists for the Virginia Biotechnology Association’s 2011 Virginia Bioscience Company of the Year Award in May. The award recognizes the firm with strong overall performance and that “best exemplifies the innovative spirit of the Virginia life sciences community.”

HemoSonics LLC received the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council’s 2011 Breakthrough Award in June for achieving the “most remarkable breakthrough or quantum advance.” In 2010, the company secured three federal grants worth nearly $2 million under the Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs.

Richmond-based WellAWARE® Systems Inc.received a 2011 Virginia Healthcare Innovators Award in April, taking top honors in the Health Information Technology category. The awards “recognize Virginia organizations that have developed innovative ways to improve health care quality and efficiency.” WellAWARE founder Robin A.Felder, Ph.D., also received the Charlottesville Business Innovation Council’s 2011 People’s Choice Navigator Award in June for demonstrating “exceptional leadership in the local or regional business community.”

Products

Phthisis Diagnostics Inc. launched its first product, the E-Sphere® Stool DNA Extraction Kit, in May 2011 after receiving $450,000 in investments. The kit streamlines the extraction of DNA from stool samples prior to analysis, improving laboratories’ efficiency and accuracy while reducing costs and risk of sample contamination.

Regulatory Affairs

Clinical Data Inc., which acquired Adenosine Therapeutics LLC in 2008 and was itself acquired by Forest Laboratories Inc. in 2011, announced in December 2010 that Santen Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. filed an Investigational New Drug application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for Clinical Data’s ATL313 drug candidate for the treatment of glaucoma and ocular hypertension. Clinical Data licensed the compound, which was developed at U.Va., to Santen in May 2010.

Forest Laboratories’ apadenoson compound, also developed at U.Va. and licensed to Clinical Data, is currently in Phase III clinical trialsfor the detection of defects in the supply of blood to the heart muscle using SPECT-MPI, or Single-Photon Emission Computed Tomography Myocardial Perfusion Imaging.

Diffusion Pharmaceuticals LLC’s lead drug candidate for the treatment of glioblastoma multiforme, or primary brain cancer, was granted orphan drug status by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Created to support the development of therapies that “treat a rare disease or condition,” the designation qualifies the company for marketing incentives and tax credits.

Knopp Biosciences LLC and Biogen Idec announced the launch of a multinational Phase III studevaluating drug candidate dexpramipexole as a potential treatment for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, in April. Knopp  licensed the drug candidate, identified at U.Va., to the Fortune 500
company in August 2010.

PluroGenTM Therapeutics Inc. received European marketing approval for its flagship burn and wound gel, PluroGel® with Silver Sulphadiazine, in August 2010 and has begun product sales in seven European countries, with more expected. PluroGen also signed an agreement worth up to $8.6 million
with the U.S. Department of Defense to fund the regulatory approval process of the company’s second product, PluroGel® PNN, and expand manufacturing. PluroGen opened a 21,000- sq.-ft. operational and manufacturing facility in January 2011.

Tau Therapeutics LLC closed a $4.2 million funding round in December 2010 to conduct a multisite clinical trial on repositioned drug mibefradil for the treatment of brain cancer. The trial will be co-sponsored by the National Institutes of Health’s Adult Brain Tumor Consortium.

On the Move

Indoor Biotechnologies Inc. announced plans in March 2011 to create the CityCampus Biotechnology Center, an expansive biotechnology research center and business incubator, in the former Coca-Cola® bottling plant on Preston Ave. in Charlottesville.