|
Arbutus Biopharma
Arbutus Biopharma Corporation is a publicly traded Canadian ( NASDAQ: ABUS) biopharmaceutical company with an expertise in liposomal drug delivery and RNA interference, and is developing drugs for hepatitis B infection. It is headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia and has research facilities in Warminster, Pennsylvania. The company was formerly known as Tekmira, which was spun out of Inex Pharmaceuticals in 2007. History Tekmira, as the company was formerly called, was formed as a wholly owned subsidiary of Inex Pharmaceuticals in 2005 after that company began collapsing after its regulatory and partnering strategy failed in 2004. Tekmira was fully spun out in 2007 and Tekmira absorbed the assets of Inex, which had been founded in 1992. Inex had been developing liposomal formulations of off-patent cancer drugs, and licensed them to Talon Pharmaceuticals in 2005; Talon was acquired by Spectrum Pharmaceuticals in 2013, and three former Inex/Tekmira products reached the ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Russell 2000 Index
The Russell 2000 Index is a small-cap stock market index that makes up the smallest 2,000 stocks in the Russell 3000 Index. It was started by the Frank Russell Company in 1984. The index is maintained by FTSE Russell, a subsidiary of the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG). Overview The Russell 2000 is by far the most common benchmark for mutual funds that identify themselves as " small-cap", while the S&P 500 index is used primarily for large capitalization stocks. It is the most widely quoted measure of the overall performance of small-cap to mid-cap company shares. It is commonly considered an indicator of the U.S. economy due to its focus on small-cap companies in the U.S. market. The index represents approximately 10% of the total market capitalization of the Russell 3000 Index. , the weighted average market capitalization for a company in the index is around $3.1 billion; the median market cap is $1.0 billion. The market cap of the largest company in the index ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RNAi
RNA interference (RNAi) is a biological process in which RNA molecules are involved in sequence-specific suppression of gene expression by double-stranded RNA, through translational or transcriptional repression. Historically, RNAi was known by other names, including ''co-suppression'', ''post-transcriptional gene silencing'' (PTGS), and ''quelling''. The detailed study of each of these seemingly different processes elucidated that the identity of these phenomena were all actually RNAi. Andrew Fire and Craig C. Mello shared the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their work on RNAi in the nematode worm ''Caenorhabditis elegans'', which they published in 1998. Since the discovery of RNAi and its regulatory potentials, it has become evident that RNAi has immense potential in suppression of desired genes. RNAi is now known as precise, efficient, stable and better than antisense therapy for gene suppression. Antisense RNA produced intracellularly by an expression vector ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pharmaceutical Companies Of Canada
A medication (also called medicament, medicine, pharmaceutical drug, medicinal drug or simply drug) is a drug used to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent disease. Drug therapy (pharmacotherapy) is an important part of the medical field and relies on the science of pharmacology for continual advancement and on pharmacy for appropriate management. Drugs are classified in multiple ways. One of the key divisions is by level of control, which distinguishes prescription drugs (those that a pharmacist dispenses only on the order of a physician, physician assistant, or qualified nurse) from over-the-counter drugs (those that consumers can order for themselves). Another key distinction is between traditional small molecule drugs, usually derived from chemical synthesis, and biopharmaceuticals, which include recombinant proteins, vaccines, blood products used therapeutically (such as IVIG), gene therapy, monoclonal antibodies and cell therapy (for instance, stem cell thera ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Biopharmaceutical Companies
A biopharmaceutical, also known as a biological medical product, or biologic, is any pharmaceutical drug product manufactured in, extracted from, or semisynthesized from biological sources. Different from totally synthesized pharmaceuticals, they include vaccines, whole blood, blood components, allergenics, somatic cells, gene therapies, tissues, recombinant therapeutic protein, and living medicines used in cell therapy. Biologics can be composed of sugars, proteins, nucleic acids, or complex combinations of these substances, or may be living cells or tissues. They (or their precursors or components) are isolated from living sources—human, animal, plant, fungal, or microbial. They can be used in both human and animal medicine. Terminology surrounding biopharmaceuticals varies between groups and entities, with different terms referring to different subsets of therapeutics within the general biopharmaceutical category. Some regulatory agencies use the terms ''biological medi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
OMERS
The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (OMERS) is a Canadian public pension fund, headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. OMERS is a defined benefit, jointly sponsored, multi-employer public pension plan created in 1962 by Ontario provincial statute to administer retirement benefits and manage pension investment funds of local government employees in the Canadian province of Ontario. , OMERS had C$121 billion of assets under management. OMERS serves over 1,000 participating employers and more than half a million active, deferred and retired employees. OMERS members are employed by municipalities, school boards, transit systems, local electrical distribution companies, police service boards, fire fighting and paramedic services, children's aid societies and associated local agencies, boards and commissions. In 2010, this fund also takes care of the pensions of firefighters, police officers, emergency physicians, employees of the Children's Aid Society, school employees o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
MRNA
In molecular biology, messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) is a single-stranded molecule of RNA that corresponds to the genetic sequence of a gene, and is read by a ribosome in the process of synthesizing a protein. mRNA is created during the process of transcription, where an enzyme ( RNA polymerase) converts the gene into primary transcript mRNA (also known as pre-mRNA). This pre-mRNA usually still contains introns, regions that will not go on to code for the final amino acid sequence. These are removed in the process of RNA splicing, leaving only exons, regions that will encode the protein. This exon sequence constitutes mature mRNA. Mature mRNA is then read by the ribosome, and, utilising amino acids carried by transfer RNA (tRNA), the ribosome creates the protein. This process is known as translation. All of these processes form part of the central dogma of molecular biology, which describes the flow of genetic information in a biological system. As in DNA, ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexion Pharmaceuticals
Alexion Pharmaceuticals is an American pharmaceutical company headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts that specializes in orphan drugs to treat rare diseases. It became an independent subsidiary of AstraZeneca in 2021. Its products include eculizumab (Soliris) with $4.064 billion in 2020 revenues and ravulizumab (Ultomiris) with $1.076 billion in 2020 revenues, both used to treat the rare disorders of atypical hemolytic uremic syndrome (aHUS) and paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria (PNH); asfotase alfa (Strensiq) with $731 million in 2020 revenues, used to treat hypophosphatasia; sebelipase alfa (Kanuma) with $117 million in 2020 revenues, used to treat lysosomal acid lipase deficiency, and andexanet alfa (Andexxa) with $78 million in 2020 revenues, used to stop life threatening or uncontrollable bleeding in people who are taking rivaroxaban or apixaban. With costs that can reach as much as $2 million per year, the drugs manufactured by Alexion are some of the most expensive d ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Department Of Defense
The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD or DOD) is an executive branch department of the federal government charged with coordinating and supervising all agencies and functions of the government directly related to national security and the United States Armed Forces. The DoD is the largest employer in the world, with over 1.34 million active-duty service members (soldiers, marines, sailors, airmen, and guardians) as of June 2022. The DoD also maintains over 778,000 National Guard and reservists, and over 747,000 civilians bringing the total to over 2.87 million employees. Headquartered at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C., the DoD's stated mission is to provide "the military forces needed to deter war and ensure our nation's security". The Department of Defense is headed by the secretary of defense, a cabinet-level head who reports directly to the president of the United States. Beneath the Department of Defense are t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
TKM-Ebola
TKM-Ebola was an experimental antiviral drug for Ebola disease that was developed by Arbutus Biopharma (formerly Tekmira Pharmaceuticals Corp.) in Vancouver, Canada. The drug candidate was formerly known as Ebola-SNALP. TKM-Ebola is a combination of small interfering RNAs targeting three of the seven proteins in Ebola virus: Zaire Ebola L polymerase, Zaire Ebola membrane-associated protein (VP24), and Zaire Ebola polymerase complex protein (VP35).David Kroll for Forbes. 7 August 201FDA Moves On Tekmira's Ebola Drug While Sarepta's Sits Unused/ref> By down-regulating these three proteins, TKM-Ebola inhibits virus replication and eliminates the infection. The drug was effective in rhesus monkeys infected with Ebola. After the Ebola outbreak in West Africa in 2014, the new variant responsible for it was isolated from several Ebola virus families and the specific genomic sequence was determined. The company re-designed TKM-Ebola and renamed it as "TKM-Ebola-Guinea". In January 2014, T ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ebola Fever
Ebola, also known as Ebola virus disease (EVD) and Ebola hemorrhagic fever (EHF), is a viral hemorrhagic fever in humans and other primates, caused by ebolaviruses. Symptoms typically start anywhere between two days and three weeks after becoming infected with the virus. The first symptoms are usually fever, sore throat, muscle pain, and headaches. These are usually followed by vomiting, diarrhoea, rash and decreased liver and kidney function, at which point, some people begin to bleed both internally and externally. The disease kills between 25% and 90% of those infected – about 50% on average. Death is often due to shock from fluid loss, and typically occurs between six and 16 days after the first symptoms appear. Early treatment of symptoms increases the survival rate considerably compared to late start. The virus spreads through direct contact with body fluids, such as blood from infected humans or other animals, or from contact with items that have recently been cont ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
West African Ebola Virus Epidemic
The 2013–2016 epidemic of Ebola virus disease, centered in Western Africa, was the most widespread outbreak of the disease in history. It caused major loss of life and socioeconomic disruption in the region, mainly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. The first cases were recorded in Guinea in December 2013; later, the disease spread to neighbouring Liberia and Sierra Leone, with minor outbreaks occurring in Ebola virus disease in Nigeria, Nigeria and Mali. Secondary infections of medical workers occurred in the United States and Spain. In addition, isolated cases were recorded in Senegal, the United Kingdom and Italy. The number of cases peaked in October 2014 and then began to decline gradually, following the commitment of substantial international resources. It caused significant mortality, with a considerable case fatality rate. By the end of the epidemic, 28,616 people had been infected; of these, 11,310 had died, for a case-fatality rate of 40%. , the World Health ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patisiran
Patisiran, sold under the brand name Onpattro, is a medication used for the treatment of polyneuropathy in people with hereditary transthyretin-mediated amyloidosis, a fatal rare disease that is estimated to affect 50,000 people worldwide. It is the first small interfering RNA-based drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the first drug approved by the FDA to treat this condition. It is a gene silencing drug that interferes with the production of an abnormal form of transthyretin. Patisiran utilizes a novel approach to target and reduce production of the TTR protein in the liver via the RNAi pathway. Patisiran was developed and is marketed by Alnylam. The FDA considers it to be a first-in-class medication. History Patisiran was granted orphan drug status, fast track designation, priority review and breakthrough therapy designation due to its novel mechanism and the rarity of the condition it treats. It was approved for medical use in the United State ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
