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New Years Newsletter
Happy New Year, From the Montana BioScience Alliance
November 2011:
With only a few day left of the Fall Season, the Montana BioScience Alliance brings you this Fall 2011 newsletter right before an upcoming La Nina Winter blankets the Big Sky State with snow!
July 2011:
Welcome to our Summer Newsletter! As the tempatures continue to rise this summer so does Montana’s sizzling BioScience Industry! The Montana Bioscience Alliance,established in 2004, is a organization dedicated to supporting and promoting Montana’s bioscience industry. “We’ve been able to use the experience we had as start ups to provide an easier road for new businesses in bioscience now in terms of support, services and networking.” Plus, Sharon Peterson attended the Vaccine Development Workshop sponsored by Pfizer on June 9th and 10th in Chicago Illinois. Discussions were held on Vaccines and Immunity, the Vaccine Landscape in the United States and Vaccines challenges. The session also included a meeting of the Midwest Council of State BioScience Associations. Anne Marie Quinn, Robert Bargatze and Sharon Peterson represented the Montana BioScience Alliance at the 2011 BIO international Convention in Washington, D.C., June 27-30. More than 15,000 biotechnology industry leaders and public officials gathered for networking, deal making and high level sessions.
March 2011:
Welcome to the Spring Newsletter! It may not officially be Spring, but we will respect the prediction of the famous groundhog, Punxsutawney Phil, and deliver the Montana BioScience Alliance’s Spring Newsletter a bit early!
October 2010:
MSU BILLINGS SCIENTISTS TO GET UNIVERSITY’S FIRST-EVER PATENT NEXT WEEK. Cell by cell and molecule by molecule, two Montana State University Billings scientists have made history.
July 2010:
McLaughlin Research Institute’s expansion of its research faculty and its facility has received a major boost in the form of a $2 million grant from the Montana Department of Commerce. According to the Department’s Director, Anthony Preite, “The economic impact of the State’s investment in McLaughlin will be felt across the state for years to come. The outcome of the important research done at McLaughlin has the potential to change the world. This facility is an outstanding asset to Montana.”
May 2010:
Welcome to the May newsletter! Ironically, winter is finally over just as Montana’s BioScience industry is heating up. Beginning with the Bio International Convention, spring 2010 is going to be filled with excitement and opportunity.
February 2010:
Many thanks to Shaun Hoover for his hard work in putting this newsletter together. In Billings it seems like winter will never end. However, spring is on its way and there are lots of exciting opportunities for 2010. The Montana BioScience Alliance is now 5 years old and looking forward to an innovative year.
November 2009:
Happy Holidays from the Montana BioScience Alliance! Please Welcome our newest member: Megan Harrington Montana World Trade Center Missoula, Mt.
September 2009:
Fall is here and Montana is a happening place! Please welcome our newest member: Leslie Rosedahl Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America 950 F. Street N.W., Washington D.C. 2004 . Also, Don’t forget to register for the Bio International Convention in Chicago, IL!
June 2009:
Summer is here! Please welcome our Montana Bioscience Alliance Intern: Shaun Hoover. Shaun is a senior at Montana State University- Billings. He will graduate in December with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with an emphasis in Marketing and Management. He has already mastered the website and the newsletter for the Montana BioScience Alliance.
March 2009:
Shodair Children’s Hospital in Helena was pleased to welcome three new key staff members to its Genetics Department recently: Tom Dennis, Ph.D., is the new director of cytogenetics in Shodair’s cytogenetics laboratory. Dr. Dennis earned his doctorate in cellular and molecular biology from the University of Nevada at Reno in 1999. Three years later, he completed a fellowship in clinical cytogenetics at the Washington, DC Medical Genetics Residency Program, operated by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Georgetown University Medical Center.
January 2009:
Patricia Weber, formerly of the International Heart Institute in Missoula, has taken a new position with the National Cancer Institute’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Development Center. The SBIR Development Center is a newly created division at the NCI that manages more than $100 million in technology projects within the small business community to accelerate the progress of cancer research.
August 2008:
Thanks to everyone who attended our annual conference! I heard a lot of positive comments about the program, and there were some great connections made. Another exciting networking opportunity is coming up, this one in Minneapolis. On September 13th, the Montana State Bobcats are playing football against the University of Minnesota at the Minneapolis Metrodome.
April 2008:
The Alliance has a new blog! Visit it at http://montanabio.blogspot.com/. We’ll be posting newsflashes and information, including legislative items, regularly. If you have suggestions for topics, email us.We’ve also added a “classifieds” section in the newsletter. You’ll find it after the events calendar.
December 2007:
GlaxoSmithKline’s Hamilton, MT manufacturing plant expansion had its grand opening on October 18, 2007. The $137 million, 130,000-square-foot facility produces the MPL adjuvant as part of the research and production of a vaccine for human papillomavirus called Cervarix. More than 130 new positions have been filled at the facility so far this year.
August 2007:
Our next roundtable will be October 18, in Missoula, in conjunction with the grand opening of the new GlaxoSmithKline facility. We’ll send more details as they are finalized.Montana Bioscience Alliance board member Gary Christianson recently resigned from GlaxoSmithKline to become COO of Biomira, a Washington State-based company which develops therapeutic products for cancer treatment. Although Gary will no longer be involved with the Alliance, his successor at GSK is expected to take his board position. Many thanks to Gary for his hard work and enthusiasm for bioscience under the big sky. We wish him much success in the future.
March 2007:
Spring is here, and we’re already bustling with activity. After a successful February legislative recption in Helena, we’re gearing up for a panel at the April Economic Development Summit in Butte, and the annual meeting (which will be in July). More information about the Summit – and some of Senator Baucus’s recent accomplishments for Montana’s bioscience industry – is below. Additional information about the annual meeting will be available soon. Hope to see you at one of these upcoming events!
December 2006:
Happy holidays to our members and supporters! We’re looking forward to working with you in 2007. Montana State University has made available for license a tolerizing agent for autoimmune, inflammatory and allergic reactions. The fusion protein is effective at extremely low doses to induce antigen-specific host tolerance in oral or nasal applications. A patent is pending and research is ongoing.
September 2006:
Thanks to everyone who attended the Montana BioScience Alliance’s first annual meeting! If you haven’t yet looked, please visit our new website, www.montanabio.org. Members, please look in the members only area for special content including access to the Alliance’s blog (members are welcome to post updates and information) and soon, the clinical trials database. If you would like to include a trial you’re working on, please contact Jana. We’ll be adding more content soon, so check back!
May 2006:
We’re a few weeks away from the first Montana BioScience Alliance Annual Meeting! The meeting will feature speakers on a range of exciting topics focusing on the future of BioScience in Montana and the entire nation.
February 2006:
This month we’re taking a look at agricultural applications of biotechnology, inspired by a fact of the week from the Progressive Policy Institute: Across the globe, 222 million acres of land are planted with biotech crops, with the US accounting for over half of biotech crop acreage – about 125 million acres.
October 2005:
Welcome to the first issue of Montana BioScience, a quarterly newsletter from the Montana BioScience Alliance designed to serve and connect our state’s biotechnology and biomedical firms, research institutes, hospitals with research and clinical trials capacity, and the very strong life sciences and related engineering presence within our universities.