The University of Queensland's multi-million dollar exit from unlisted Brisbane biotech Xenome has led to the establishment of a new $750,000 proof-of-concept fund for reinvestment in commercially viable research projects at UQ's Institute for Molecular Bioscience. [ + ]

Despite a strong cash position of AUD$44.8 million, boosted by an interim net profit after tax of $23.9 million for the half-year ended 31 March 2005, Sydney biotech Peptech (ASX:PTD) has said it is "not actively participating in the M&A space" at the moment, and denied renewed speculation of a merger with Melbourne's Amrad (ASX:AMD). [ + ]

GlaxoSmithKline Research and Development is to buy two Brain Resource Laboratories from Sydney-based brain function databasecompiler Brain Resource Company (ASX:BRC), for operation at Quintiles' Guys Drug Research Unit in London. [ + ]

Christine Cussen has resigned from her role as chief executive of drug re-engineering company Eiffel (ASX:EIF), at a time when the company's share price has dipped below $0.04 - more than two thirds below its level in January of around $0.12. [ + ]

Biotechnology stocks have been hit hard in calendar 2005 with the Intersuisse biotechnology index showing a fall of 23 per cent, including a 10 per cent fall in April. [ + ]

A gene therapy method that doesn't rely on potentially toxic viruses as vectors may be growing closer as the result of in vitro research results reported by University at Buffalo scientists in the current online issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A new Biomarker Discovery Laboratory was opened today at Australian Proteomics Analysis Facility (APAF) at Macquarie University, approximately ten years after scientists including Keith Williams and Marc Wilkins initiated the science now known as 'proteomics' on that very site. [ + ]

Within a day of putting out a call for families with a history of Parkinson's disease to participate in a project to identify susceptibility genes for the disease, Hobart's Menzies Research Institute had five families signed up. [ + ]

Howard Leibman, who advised Heartware (ASX:HTW) during its recent ASX-listing as an associate director of specialist biotech investment bank Emerging Growth Capital, has been poached by the artificial heart company. [ + ]

CSIRO Plant Industry has applied to the Office of the Gene Technology Regulator (OGTR) to conduct a field trial of gene-knockout rice varieties, as part of the national research organisation's contribution to the international 'Green Machine' functional genomics project. [ + ]

Melbourne's Acrux (ASX: ACR) has Adam Watkinson as its chief scientific officer. Watkinson is currently manager of drug delivery research and project manager at UK pharmaceutical company ProStrakan . [ + ]

Bioscience entrepreneurs, including Axon Instruments founder Alan Finkel and Fiona Wood and Marie Stoner of Clinical Cell Culture, have dominated the winners' circle at this year's ATSE Clunies Ross Awards. [ + ]

A preclinical trial of Metabolic Pharmaceuticals' (ASX:MBP) conotoxin peptide painkiller hints that if it makes it to the clinic, it could provide a health bonus for patients suffering chronic neuropathic pain. [ + ]

The US Patent Office has granted Perth biotech Phylogica's application for a patent on its technology for isolating biological modulators from its burgeoning library of gene fragments from "extremophile" microbes. [ + ]

The Australian Proteome Analysis Facility (APAF) is gearing up to launch its new Biomarker Discovery Laboratory and is already on the verge of signing a pharmaceutical company partner for a project. [ + ]