Category Archives: Biotechnology

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Research and Markets (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/rddx98/company_study_of_w) has announced the addition of the "Company Study of Walvax Biotechnology Co, Ltd.,2012" company profile to their offering.

Walvax Biotechnology Co, Ltd., founded in 2001, specializes in research & development, production and marketing of bio-pharmaceutical vaccines. In September 2010, it went public on the Shenzhen's Growth Enterprise Market (GEM), with the approval of China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC). Walvax Biotechnology employs about 863 people, including 161 for research and development. It has a new-type vaccine research & development center and pilot base at Kunming High-tech Industrial Development Zone (located in Kunming, Yunnan province) as well as vaccine production bases at Yuxi Hi-Tech & New Industrial Development Zone (located in Yuxi, Yunnan province) and Taizhou National Medical Hi-Tech Development Zone (located in Taizhou, Jiangsu province). In addition, its marketing network covers 30 provinces or cities and more than 2000 regions or counties throughout China

Key Topics Covered:

1 Profile

2 Operation

3 Revenue Structure

4 Gross Margin

5 Client and Supplier

6 R&D and Investment

See the article here:
Research and Markets: Company Study of Walvax Biotechnology Co, Ltd.,2012

ATLANTA, GA--(Marketwire -06/11/12)- GeoVax Labs, Inc. (GOVX) (GOVX), an Atlanta-based biotechnology firm developing vaccines to prevent and fight Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infections, is attending the BIO International Convention taking place June 18-21 in Boston, MA at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, and will exhibit at Booth Number 1035 in the Georgia Pavilion. Exhibit hours are 12:00 pm - 5:00 pm on June 18, 10:00 am - 6:30 pm on June 19, 10:00 am to 5:00 pm on June 20 and 10:00 am to 1:00 pm on the final day, June 21.

GeoVax's President and CEO, Dr. Robert McNally, Board Chairman, David Dodd, and colleagues will be available to meet with interested parties either within the Georgia Pavilion or through the BIO partnering system to discuss the Company's preventive and therapeutic HIV/AIDS vaccine programs. In addition, Company executives anticipate meetings with the third party manufacturers of GeoVax's vaccines; with its contacts at analytical laboratories with which it is currently working; and with some of the Company's research partners.

About BIO

BIO represents more than 1,200 biotechnology companies, academic institutions, state biotechnology centers and related organizations across the United States and in more than 30 other nations. BIO members are involved in the research and development of innovative healthcare, agricultural, industrial and environmental biotechnology products. BIO also produces the BIO International Convention, the world's largest gathering of the biotechnology industry, along with industry-leading investor and partnering meetings held around the world. For more information, please visit http://www.bio.org.

About GeoVax

GeoVax Labs, Inc. is a biotechnology company developing human vaccines for HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus - that leads to AIDS). GeoVax's HIV/AIDS vaccine technology is exclusively licensed from Emory University in Atlanta, GA, and is the subject of more than 20 issued or filed patent applications. GeoVax vaccines are designed for use in uninfected people to prevent acquisition of HIV-1 and limit the progression to AIDS should a person become infected. GeoVax vaccines are also being tested as a therapeutic treatment (for people already infected with the HIV-1 virus).

GeoVax's core vaccine technologies were developed by Dr. Harriet Robinson, Chief Scientific Officer, through a collaboration of colleagues at Emory University's Vaccine Center, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and GeoVax. The technology uses recombinant DNA to prime the immune response and recombinant modified vaccinia Ankara (MVA) to boost the primed response. Both the DNA vaccine and the MVA vaccine express non-infectious virus-like-particles displaying the natural trimeric form of the HIV envelope protein.

GeoVax's vaccines have moved forward in human clinical trials conducted by the HIV Vaccine Trials Network (HVTN) based in Seattle, Washington. These trials have tested various combinations and doses of the DNA and MVA vaccines, their ability to raise anti-HIV humoral (antibody) and cellular (cytotoxic T cell) immune responses, as well as, the vaccines' safety. Successful results from Phase 1 testing supported Phase 2 testing in an ongoing, fully enrolled, 299 participant trial in North and South America. The vaccine is also undergoing Phase 1/2 testing as a therapeutic in HIV-infected individuals.

Excerpt from:
GeoVax to Attend BIO International Convention June 18-21 in Boston

Background:
Presently, different studies are conducted related to the topic of biomass potential to generate through anaerobic fermentation process alternative fuels supposed to support the existing fossil fuel resources, which are more and more needed, in quantity, but also in quality of so called green energy. The present study focuses on depicting an optional way of capitalizing agricultural biomass residues using anaerobic fermentation in order to obtain biogas with satisfactory characteristics.. The research is based on wheat bran and a mix of damaged ground grains substrates for biogas production.
Results:
The information and conclusions delivered offer results covering the general characteristics of biomass used , the process parameters with direct impact over the biogas production (temperature regime, pH values) and the daily biogas production for each batch relative to the used material.
Conclusions:
All conclusions are based on processing of monitoring process results , with accent on temperature and pH influence on the daily biogas production for the two batches. The main conclusion underlines the fact that the mixture batch produces a larger quantity of biogas, using approximately the same process conditions and input, in comparison to alone analyzed probes, indicating thus a higher potential for the biogas production than the wheat bran substrate. Adrian Eugen Cioabla, Ioana Ionel, Gabriela-Alina Dumitrel and Francisc Popescu contributed equally to this work.Source:
http://www.biotechnologyforbiofuels.com/rss/

Background:
Phaeodactylum tricornutum is a unicellular diatom in the class Bacillariophyceae. The full genome has been sequenced (<30 Mb), and approximately 20 to 30% triacylglyceride (TAG) accumulation on a dry cell basis has been reported under different growth conditions. To elucidate P. tricornutum gene expression profiles during nutrient-deprivation and lipidaccumulation, cell cultures were grown with a nitrate to phosphate ratio of 20:1 (N:P) and whole-genome transcripts were monitored over time via RNA-sequence determination.
Results:
The specific Nile Red (NR) fluorescence (NR fluorescence per cell) increased over time; however, the increase in NR fluorescence was initiated before external nitrate was completely exhausted. Exogenous phosphate was depleted before nitrate, and these results indicated that the depletion of exogenous phosphate might be an early trigger for lipid accumulation that is magnified upon nitrate depletion. As expected, many of the genes associated with nitrate and phosphate utilization were up-expressed. The diatom-specific cyclins cyc7 and cyc10 were down-expressed during the nutrient-deplete state, and cyclin B1 was up-expressed during lipid-accumulation after growth cessation. While many of the genes associated with the C3 pathway for photosynthetic carbon reduction were not significantly altered, genes involved in a putative C4 pathway for photosynthetic carbon assimilation were up-expressed as the cells depleted nitrate, phosphate, and exogenous dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) levels. P.tricornutum has multiple, putative carbonic anhydrases, but only two were significantly upexpressed (2-fold and 4-fold) at the last time point when exogenous DIC levels had increased after the cessation of growth. Alternative pathways that could utilize HCO3-were also suggested by the gene expression profiles (e.g., putative propionyl-CoA and methylmalonylCoA decarboxylases).
Conclusions:
The results indicate that P. tricornutum continued carbon dioxide reduction when population growth was arrested and different carbon-concentrating mechanisms were used dependent upon exogenous DIC levels. Based upon overall low gene expression levels for fatty acid synthesis, the results also suggest that the build-up of precursors to the acetyl-CoA carboxylases may play a more significant role in TAG synthesis rather than the actual enzyme levels of acetyl-CoA carboxylases per se. The presented insights into the types and timing of cellular responses to inorganic carbon will help maximize photoautotrophic carbonflow to lipid accumulation.Source:
http://www.biotechnologyforbiofuels.com/rss/

Background:
Renewable energy production is currently a major issue worldwide. Biogas is a promising renewable energy carrier as the technology of its production combines the elimination of organic waste with the formation of a versatile energy carrier, methane. In consequence of the complexity of the microbial communities and metabolic pathways involved the biotechnology of the microbiological process leading to biogas production is poorly understood. Metagenomic approaches are suitable means of addressing related questions. In the present work a novel high-throughput technique was tested for its benefits in resolving the functional and taxonomical complexity of such microbial consortia.
Results:
It was demonstrated that the extremely parallel SOLiDTM short-read DNA sequencing platform is capable of providing sufficient useful information to decipher the systematic and functional contexts within a biogas-producing community. Although this technology has not been employed to address such problems previously, the data obtained compare well with those from similar high-throughput approaches such as 454-pyrosequencing GS FLX or Titanium. The predominant microbes contributing to the decomposition of organic matter include members of the Eubacteria, class Clostridia, order Clostridiales, family Clostridiaceae. Bacteria belonging in other systematic groups contribute to the diversity of the microbial consortium. Archaea comprise a remarkably small minority in this community, given their crucial role in biogas production. Among the Archaea, the predominant order is the Methanomicrobiales and the most abundant species is Methanoculleus marisnigri. The Methanomicrobiales are hydrogenotrophic methanogens. Besides corroborating earlier findings on the significance of the contribution of the Clostridia to organic substrate decomposition, the results demonstrate the importance of the metabolism of hydrogen within the biogas producing microbial community.
Conclusions:
Both microbiological diversity and the regulatory role of the hydrogen metabolism appear to be the driving forces optimizing biogas-producing microbial communities. The findings may allow a rational design of these communities to promote greater efficacy in large-scale practical systems. The composition of an optimal biogas-producing consortium can be determined through the use of this approach, and this systematic methodology allows thedesign of the optimal microbial community structure for any biogas plant. In this way, metagenomic studies can contribute to significant progress in the efficacy and economic improvement of biogas production.Source:
http://www.biotechnologyforbiofuels.com/rss/

Background:
For cellulosic biofuels processes, suitable characterization of the lignin remaining within the cell wall and correlation of quantified properties of lignin to cell wall polysaccharide enzymatic deconstruction is underrepresented in the literature. This is particularly true for grasses which represent a number of promising bioenergy feedstocks where quantification of grass lignins is particularly problematic due to the high fraction of p-ydroxycinnamates. The main focus of this work is to use grasses with a diverse range of lignin properties, and applying multiple lignin characterization platforms, attempt to correlate the differences in these lignin properties to the susceptibility to alkaline hydrogen peroxide (AHP) pretreatment and subsequent enzymatic deconstruction.
Results:
We were able to determine that the enzymatic hydrolysis of cellulose to to glucose (i.e.digestibility) of four grasses with relatively diverse lignin phenotypes could be correlated to total lignin content and the content of p-hydroxycinnamates, while S/G ratios did not appear to contribute to the enzymatic digestibility or delignification. The lignins of the brown midrib corn stovers tested were significantly more condensed than a typical commercial corn stover and a significant finding was that pretreatment with alkaline hydrogen peroxide increases the fraction of lignins involved in condensed linkages from 88-95% to ~99% for all the corn stovers tested, which is much more than has been reported in the literature for other pretreatments. This indicates significant scission of beta-O-4 bonds by retreatment and/or induction of lignin condensation reactions. The S/G ratios in grasses determined by analytical pyrolysis are significantly lower than values obtained using either thioacidolysis or 2DHSQC NMR due to presumed interference by ferulates.
Conclusions:
It was found that grass cell wall polysaccharide hydrolysis by cellulolytic enzymes for grasses exhibiting a diversity of lignin structures and compositions could be linked to quantifiable changes in the composition of the cell wall and properties of the lignin including apparent content of the p-hydroxycinnamates while the limitations of S/G estimation in grasses is highlighted.Source:
http://www.biotechnologyforbiofuels.com/rss/