Bio-IT World | Imaging in drug discovery has been rising to the forefront of conversations more and more recently. Managing editor Allison Proffitt spoke with Ken Kilgore, Director of Immunology Pharmacology at Janssen Research & Development (formerly Centocor Research & Development), a Johnson & Johnson company, about how—and why—imaging’s role is changing in drug discovery.

Biodesix has announced the issuance of three additional patents which provide intellectual property protection for head and neck tests, lung cancer patient selection, and monitoring.

The year 2011 ended with multiple acquisitions and research partnerships through which the drug majors Takeda Pharmaceutical, Merck & Co., Eli Lilly & Co., and AstraZeneca gain access to compounds that biotech firms are developing for the treatment of cancer.

Drug maker Bristol-Myers Squibb and the Gladstone Institutes will collaborate to find new ways to treat Alzheimer's disease, the two said Thursday.

Further deepening its commitment to China, Quintiles today announced the launch of Kun Tuo, a local contract research organization (CRO) built to service the unique needs of the Chinese biopharmaceutical industry and multinational biopharma companies operating in China. Kun Tuo will provide a full range of services, including comprehensive clinical trial management, regulatory submission preparation, biostatistics and data management. Kun Tuo will tap Quintiles' global resources and expertise to develop customized offerings in key therapeutic areas, along with vaccines, late phase studies, medical devices and diagnostics.

News Brief | Neox Clinical Research, a leading European full service Clinical Research Organization with headquarters in the Czech Republic, will be opening an office in San Diego, California in the first quarter of 2012 as their North American headquarters. Neox delivers clinical trials to pharmaceutical, biotechnology, medical device and other CRO's throughout Europe, with a strong presence in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). Having more than 350 clinical research professionals in all CEE countries and Western Europe, and another 50 employees in partnering CRO's, makes Neox one of the largest European CRO's.

A series of acquisitions is expanding and refining the company’s focus, explains CSO Dan Marshak.

At a conference in Australia on 17th of November, cancer experts were told that the country's ability to achieve new information in genomics is under threat, due to an outdated health system that can't keep up with the rate of genomic discovery.

Hippocrates put it succinctly, “It is far more important to know what person the disease has than what disease the person has.”

The Food and Drug Administration’s decision to revoke approval of Roche’s Avastin for advanced breast cancer is likely to curtail use of the $6 billion-a-year drug for such patients. But it’s not likely to put an end to prescribing.

Bio-IT World | Bio-IT World has announced that Eric Perakslis (the newly appointed FDA CIO), Martin Leach (CIO, Broad Institute) and Jill Mesirov (chief informatics officer, Broad Institute) will be the featured keynote speakers at the 10th anniversary Bio-IT World Conference & Expo, which will be held in Boston on April 24-26, 2012.

A new survey of contract research trends in Asia Pacific shows mostly small-to-medium contracts in Phase III focused on oncology.

Today, nearly 3 years after being tapped to shake things up at Sanofi, Christopher Viehbacher can take credit for reorganizing the company, divesting into growth areas and making enough smart deals that last month he promised investors 5 percent annual revenue growth for the next four years.

Eli Lilly and Amylin Pharmaceuticals yesterday said they’d scrapped their diabetes-drug partnership, with Amylin paying $250 million to Lilly upfront and as much as $1.2 billion later depending on sales of drugs containing the molecule exenatide.

In preparation for American Diabetes Month in November, PatientsLikeMe and BBK Worldwide announced today the launch of a new online diabetes health movement entitled “Calling All Types.” This innovative social health initiative encourages people with Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes to share their real-world experiences and help raise awareness of this disease.