March 20, 2006 – Merck partnered with Neuromed Pharma for a pain drug in a deal worth up to $475 million; Schering-Plough agreed to collaborate with PTC Therapeutics on its oral drug for hepatitis C; Aastrom Biosciences teamed up with Orthovita to develop a bone repair therapy; Spectrum Pharma bought the oncology operations of Targent; Exelixis and Sankyo agreed to develop jointly drugs for cardiovascular and metabolic diseases; Lilly will use a biomarker from Biosite in a clinical trial of its severe sepsis drug, Xigris; SciClone won orphan drug designation for Zadaxin, a treatment for malignant melanoma; AstraZeneca is underwriting a clinical trial using Nexium, its anti-acid drug; Sunesis Pharma has begun a Phase II trial of a small cell lung cancer drug; Boston Life Sciences ended early a Phase III trial of Altropane, its imaging agent for Parkinsons disease; Isotechnika released positive preliminary 48-week data from a trial of a psoriasis drug; ChemGenex Pharma announced the FDA granted orphan drug designation to its leukemia drug; and Nymox, which was more than 95% higher last week, added another 24% today. The Centient Biotech 200™ was 6.5 points higher at 4066.19, a rise of .16%. More details...
