Immuto Scientific Inc. plans to use its $2.3 million in seed funding for equipment and staffing needed to take its analytical research services to market with pharmaceutical companies, according to a recent announcement. It says its technology will make drug discovery and development more efficient.

Read more at Wisconsin Inno.

Exelixis, Inc. (Nasdaq: EXEL) and Invenra, Inc. today announced that they have expanded their discovery and licensing collaboration to include an additional 20 oncology targets. The augmented partnership builds on the two companies’ ongoing collaboration and license agreement to discover and develop mono-specific and multi-specific antibodies for incorporation into novel biologics to treat cancer, which was originally announced in May 2018 and expanded in October 2019.

Read more at Business Wire.

FluGen, Inc., a clinical-stage vaccine company transforming vaccine efficacy in infectious respiratory diseases, today announced the initiation of the first study in older adults of M2SR, the company’s investigational supra-seasonal, live, single-replication, intranasal influenza (flu) vaccine. Funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), this study will assess the safety, tolerability, and immunological response to M2SR in adults up to age 85, a population most vulnerable to serious complications and mortality from the flu. The study will evaluate subjects’ ability to raise antibodies against matched and drifted strains of the influenza virus.

Read more at PRNewswire.

SHINE Medical Technologies LLC and Phoenix LLC today announced that the companies have completed a merger under which Phoenix has become a wholly owned subsidiary of SHINE.

SHINE is a next-generation nuclear technology company focused on unlocking the power of fusion technologies to benefit the planet and humankind. The company’s goal is to deliver on the long-term promise of clean fusion energy by advancing fusion technology starting with the commercialization of medical isotopes. Phoenix designs and manufactures the world’s strongest steady-state fusion neutron generators used for advanced industrial imaging and other applications for improving safety and quality in the aerospace, defense, medical and energy sectors.

The combined company represents the first two phases of the long-term vision of Greg Piefer, the founder of both companies, for producing clean energy from fusion (see “SHINE’s Four-Phase Progression to Clean Energy Production” below). The goal of each phase of SHINE’s approach is to build additional capacity and capability, and deepen scientific understanding of fusion technology as it progresses to clean fusion energy production. Each step through the four phases is expected to provide further proof of the technology’s robustness, a foundation for ongoing innovation in the next phase and the creation of value for the company, its customers, and shareholders.

Read more at Business Wire.

An international collaboration of virologists at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and the vaccine companies FluGen and Bharat Biotech has begun the development and testing of a unique vaccine against COVID-19 called CoroFlu.

CoroFlu will build on the backbone of FluGen’s flu vaccine candidate known as M2SR. Based on an invention by UW­–Madison virologists and FluGen co-founders Yoshihiro Kawaoka and Gabriele Neumann, M2SR is a self-limiting version of the influenza virus that induces an immune response against the flu. Kawaoka’s lab will insert gene sequences from SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes the disease COVID-19, into M2SR so that the new vaccine will also induce immunity against the coronavirus.

Read more here.

Invenra Inc. announced that it has expanded its collaboration with Exelixis, Inc. (Nasdaq: EXEL). Exelixis and Invenra had entered into a collaboration on May 2^nd, 2018 to discover and develop multispecific antibodies through the use of Invenra’s B-Body^TM technology platform. The new collaboration will continue to use the Invenra antibody discovery capabilities to generate additional biologics-based programs.

Read more at BusinessWire.

Phoenix, LLC, a Madison, WI nuclear technology company, and SHINE Medical Technologies, a Janesville, WI medical isotope production company, today announced completion of a 132-hour test of the high-flux Phoenix neutron generator that will drive SHINE’s medical isotope production system. This is a vital milestone in proving out the performance and reliability of Phoenix’s neutron generator technology and SHINE’s medical isotope production process.

SHINE will displace the use of reactors and weapons-grade uranium by using a safer, low-waste, low-enriched uranium process driven by 8 Phoenix neutron generators. The weekly SHINE production cycle will require these particle accelerator systems to operate for 132 consecutive hours, or 5.5 days, with better than 95% uptime. During the recent successful technology demonstration, Phoenix’s second-generation neutron generator prototype operated in SHINE’s Janesville, WI facility with an average neutron yield 10% higher than required and uptime higher than 99%. These results prove that Phoenix’s core technology is more than capable of reliably driving SHINE’s medical isotope production and serves as a major technology risk mitigation step for both companies.

Read more at PRNewswire.

Phoenix, LLC, a Wisconsin-based nuclear technology company, has secured $4 million in funding from the US Army to demonstrate innovative neutron-based methods of nondestructive testing utilizing its high flux neutron generators.

Phoenix’s latest contract funds demonstration of a high-throughput, high-resolution thermal neutron imaging system as well as a fast neutron imaging system. Further, Phoenix will take the first steps toward fusing neutron radiographs with X-rays to present inspectors with complementary information in the form of a hybrid image.

“With N-ray and X-ray capabilities merged, the technology Phoenix is developing will be instrumental in the inspection of large, complex munitions for the military and vital to ensuring our warfighters continue to receive safe and effective munitions produced in the most efficient manner,” says Phoenix President Evan Sengbusch.

Read more at PRNewswire.

FluGen, Inc. today announced preliminary data from a human challenge trial with its investigational intranasal M2SR vaccine showing, for the first time, protection against a highly mismatched influenza virus. This major step toward demonstrating breadth of protection is key to developing a universal flu vaccine against flu viruses that have significantly drifted from the strains contained in the vaccines.

The goal of FluGen’s Phase 2 M2SR study was to test whether its flu vaccine could demonstrate the broad protection required during years when there is a mismatch between the vaccine and the circulating influenza strain. The topline results from a six-year mismatch confirm the strong results seen in Phase 1 immunogenicity and preclinical challenge studies.

The double-blind, placebo-controlled Phase 2 clinical trial of 99 healthy adults, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense, compared FluGen’s M2SR vaccine matching a virus from 2007 against a challenge with a live H3N2 influenza virus from the 2014-15 flu season. Study subjects were randomized 1:1 to receive either intranasal placebo, or a single intranasal dose of M2SR vaccine. The development of M2SR has also been supported by the National Institutes for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) division of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the effectiveness of the marketed inactivated flu vaccine from the 2014-15 flu season was just 19 percent overall and close to zero percent in those 65 and older. The mismatch tested in the FluGen clinical study was significantly greater than the mismatch between the marketed injectable vaccine and the predominant circulating influenza virus in 2014-15.

Read more at BusinessWire.

Invenra and WARF (Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation) today announced they have entered into a collaboration to discover and develop a bispecific antibody therapeutic for the treatment of neuroblastoma, a cancer that is the third most common childhood cancer, after leukemia and brain tumors.  The collaboration will use Invenra’s proprietary SNIPERTM technology to allow for precise targeting of the cancer cells while sparing normal nerve cells, and potentially alleviating unwanted toxicities and pain related side effects. The idea for the therapeutic candidate came out of a collaboration between Invenra and University of Wisconsin, Madison Professor, Dr. Paul Sondel, a pediatric oncologist who treats these children in his practice.

“Invenra’s SNIPERTM technology should enable creation of antibody-based therapies that are specifically able to target tumor cells while not binding to normal tissues. We are excited to be working with Invenra to initiate this approach by directing it towards improving treatment for pediatric neuroblastoma”, notes Sondel.

Read more at Invenra.com.