By Katie Bird , 28-Oct-2009, www.cosmeticsdesign-europe.com

Proteins in milk that form part of the cow’s natural protection against milking related infections can be formulated into anti-microbial cosmetics and oral care products, according to manufacturer Quantec.

The New Zealand-based company has been working on the Immune Defence Proteins (IDP) for three years and is now ready to launch the ingredients onto the skin care and supplements market.

Rod Claycomb, managing director of the company, explained how the proteins form part of the cow’s own defence system.

“After milking, cows are quite prone to bacterial infection of the mammary gland called mastitis. This suite of proteins is nature’s own way of helping to protect the cow,” he said.

According to Claycomb, there are applications for the proteins in both human and animal health.

Having worked in both the animal health & human skincare sectors, this sounds to me like an interesting innovation & great breakthrough- with scientific and potentially commercial benefits. What do you think? Read the full article and let us know. Chris Penfold

Read the full article here: http://tinyurl.com/yz4937q

Published By James Quinn, Daily Telegraph, 26 Oct 2009

Save for the economy, in the first year of Barack Obama’s presidency the issue he has spent the most time on has also been the most contentious – the future of healthcare.

As he tries to right the failings of several of his predecessors, the US president’s push to increase healthcare provision for the 20pc of Americans without health insurance – at the same time as not overly increasing the burden on taxpayers – is a difficult task.

With the US budget deficit at $1.42 trillion, the $829m (£506m), ten-year cost of the Senate finance committee’s bill – the main one of five pieces of legislation President Obama is to attempt to meld together in the coming weeks – may just be too much to bear.
Whatever the outcome, however, it is clear that the $2.3 trillion-a-year US healthcare industry offers significant opportunities to make money.

For British companies, the sheer breadth of the market – with its regionalised approach and the power of private medical insurance companies – might be unnerving, but in fact offers clear advantages, as Nottingham, UK  based Design Cognition hope to capitalise on over the coming weeks as part of a UK Trade & Investment (UKTI) “mission” to the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) in November.

If you are a company that want to launch your pharma products into new markets but are confused by packaging requirements & regulations, find out more about how Design Cognition can help at www.thepharmagateway.com

Design Cognition is also looking for individuals /companies that can provide collaborative support ‘on the ground’ in the US to help facilitate entry into the US pharma market. For further details contact Chris Penfold, Chief Executive.

You can read the full Daily Telegraph article here: http://tinyurl.com/yg2pkoc

Simulating drug-packaging conditions can save up to six months in development time.

For pharmaceutical companies, time is money: Those who get to market first with a new product will often capture the largest customer share and maximize profits.Innovators of new drugs commit considerable resources to developing and seeking approval for breakthrough products. The sooner they can market a new product, the sooner they can begin to see returns on their investment. Time is of the essence for manufacturers of generic drugs, too, since they often have a suite of drug applications pending and vie with competitors to be the first to commercialize their products for the 180-day period of marketing exclusivity. For these reasons, technologies and services that streamline drug development can provide important competitive advantages to drug manufacturers.Sophisticated packaging simulation modeling can help formulation chemists and packaging engineers identify the right conditions in which to ensure the stability and potency of drugs. This mechanism, referred to as ‘pseudo-empirical’ modeling, can be performed early in the development process, guiding production decisions and helping to avoid costly errors that could prove to be roadblocks to production.Pseudo-empirical modeling is a technique that uses empirically derived data measurements from the packaging materials, including moisture vapor transmission rate MVTR through the bottle, surface area of the bottle, sorbent adsorption isotherms, and drug product adsorption/desorption isotherms. Linking these variables together mathematically will pseudo-empirically predict the relative humidity of a pharmaceutical package’s headspace and drug product hydration level over time. This resulting information will ultimately determine the means by which manufacturers can maintain a drug’s chemical and physical characteristics over time.

via Healthcare Packaging.

GSK takes a shine to filmless, ‘green’ holography cartons

A new carton for GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare’s Aquafresh White & Shine toothpaste shimmers with a subtle holographic rainbow effect with a heavy emphasis on the green end of the spectrum. Through the use of new printing technology, the carton is as easy to recycle —something that most holographic packages cannot claim.: “Traditional holographic packaging contains a laminated layer of metallized polyester that does not remove easily from the paperboard, making recycling very difficult,” says Michael J. Larocca, packaging development manager for GSK Consumer Healthcare. “This package has no polyester or metal content. As a result, there is no impact to typical paperboard recycling streams.”

via GSK takes a shine to filmless, ‘green’ holography | Greener Package.  by Anne Marie Mohan, Managing Editor, GreenerPackage.com

Really interesting article, nice to see that the UK have been named number 1 for something so positive. (Jane)

For decades European countries have been among the most innovative on the planet when it comes to drug development. Scientists at stellar academic centers like the Karolinska Institute in Sweden and the Oxford/Cambridge university axis in the UK have produced some of the best thinking on new drugs the industry has seen. And clusters of developers in Switzerland, the UK and places like the Medicon Valley in northern Denmark and southern Sweden have spawned their share of start-ups. Germany has seen a whole generation of biotech companies launched with public assistance from the BioRegions it began to establish more than a decade ago.

via European Biotechnology, European Biotech – FierceBiotech.

Unilever has signed a research agreement with a US company in order to explore transdermal delivery technologies. Massachusetts-based BioChemics developed its transdermal drug delivery system VALE Vasi-active Lipid Encapusulated initially for use in the pharmaceutical sector, but it believes it has potential cosmetic applications. The company has signed the agreement with the Anglo-Dutch consumer goods

via #atssh-twitter.

By Katie Bird , 06-Oct-09  www.cosmeticsdesign-europe.com