20 2010
International Seaweed Symposium to be held in Ensenada Baja California México, February 22-26, 2010
The symposium offers the opportunity to stay abreast of the most recent advances in applied phycology and industrial opportunities. Learn about new topics of global interest such as the use of genomic data in the development of new cultivars, advances in the understanding of plant and animal response mechanisms to seaweed extracts, and exciting advances in the understanding of the metabolism of algal polysaccharides.
Other relevant topics will include the role of seaweeds as carbon sink, seaweeds as a source of biofuels, and the feasibility and implications of large-scale cultivation. The problems associated with the spread of non-indigenous species, seaweed diseases and their effects on seaweed farms, as well as the effect on the ecology of seaweed communities will also be discussed.
31 2010
GRC hosts Marine Natural Products conference in California, Feb 2010
The mission of the 2010 MNP GRC is to bring traditional participants in this area, including natural products chemists, synthetic chemists and marine biologists, together with specialists in newly emerging areas of marine microbiology, molecular biology, genetic engineering and genomics in a highly interactive forum where new avenues of research will be developed.
Applications for this meeting must be submitted by February 7, 2010.
28 2010
Federal stimulus dollars go to cooperative group targeting discovery of marine-derived anticancer leads
The overall goal of the National Cooperative Drug Discovery Group (NCDDG) program is to discover marine natural product leads for cancer chemotherapy. There are four laboratory programs operating in a close and synergistic fashion as follows:
- Lab Program #1 led by Prof. Phillip Crews (PI of this NCDDG), University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC)
- Lab Program #2 led by Prof. William Gerwick, Oregon State University (OSU)
- Lab Program #3 led by Dr. Amy Wright, Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution (HBOI)
- Lab Program #4 led by Prof. William Fenical, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego (SIO-UCSD).
| Amount of Award: | $273,147 |
| Award Date: | 09/25/2009 |
11 2009
Seaweed Agent Used for Anti-Blood Clotting Product
An extract from seaweed harvested from the east coast waters of Tasmania, Australia’s southern island state, may soon be sold pharmaceutically as a natural agent to prevent blood clots. The biotechnology company Marinova believes there is potentially a huge market for its pharmaceutical equivalent to the controversial drug Heparin which is used medically in cancer therapy, wound treatment and as an anticoagulant.
11 2008
Capacity Doubled For Marine-Derived Pharmaceutical
Danish firm Pronova BioPharma announced recently that it is to double manufacturing capacity for its marine-derived active pharmaceutical ingredient (API), following increased demand for its omega-3 based drug. Work on the new facility is due to begin, with the plant expected to be operational and approved by regulators by the first half of 2010. The company is investing NOK1.45-1.7bn (€189-222m) on the brand new plant in Kalundborg, Denmark, which will contribute an additional 1,200 tonnes of active ingredient per year and will be fitted out with the same technology and will have the same structure as Pronova’s existing site in Sandefjord. Both production facilities are used to manufacture the API for the company’s Omacor product (Lovaza in the US), which is the first and only EU and US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved omega-3 derived prescription drug according to the company, and is prescribed to treat elevated levels of triglycerides, a condition known as hypertriglyceridemia (HTG). Also, the drug has been approved in Europe for patients having just suffered a heart attack.
11 2008
Surplus Jellyfish Seen as Additive Source
In recent years populations of jellyfish have been exploding, which may present the food and cosmetics industries
with interesting new additives.Writing in the Journal of Natural Products, researchers from the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research in Saitama, and Shimva Chemical Industries in Kyoto, describe a process for extracting high yields of a protein substance called mucin that could be used as a starting material for production of designer mucins with multiple uses. The researchers investigated the extraction from five species of jellyfish of a novel glycoprotein, a member of the mucin family. The yields, ranging from one to three per cent of dry weight, and 0.02 to 0.1 per cent of wet weight, were classified as high. The extracted polymeric substance from all of the species formed a gel in aqueous solution. The researchers have labeled this substance, which is common in jellyfish and similar to the human mucin MUC5AC, “qniumucin” and have suggested the utilization of this compound as a new marine resource, based on the present commercial use of gastric mucin from porcine stomachs and bovine submaxillary glands, towards and potential for use in food and cosmetics.
11 2008
Simple Method Developed to Create Natural Drug Products
A team led by Qian Cheng and Bradley Moore of UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography was recently able to synthesize an antibiotic natural product created by a Hawaiian sea sediment bacterium. They did so by combining a cocktail of enzymes, the protein catalysts inside cells, in a relatively simple mixing process inside a laboratory flask. “This study may signal the start of a new era in how drugs are synthesized,” said Moore. Most of the medicinal drugs on the market today are made synthetically. Researchers such as Moore and Scripps Oceanography’s Bill Fenical have looked to the oceans as rich sources of new natural products to potentially combat diseases such as cancer. The antibiotic synthesized in Moore’s laboratory, called enterocin, was assembled in approximately two hours. The new research also carries the potential to combine certain natural enzymes to produce new molecules that typically cannot be found in nature with the goal of developing new drugs. Moore calls these “unnatural natural products.”
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