“MSU to spend $43.2M on Plant Science Expansion - WZZM 13” plus 4 more

MSU to spend $43.2M on Plant Science Expansion - WZZM 13
Teacher played football at OSU, was TARTA aide - Toledo Blade
Key Systems Biology Components of Therasis Filter(TM) Lead to ... - Yahoo Finance
Ottawa Hills High School's original wing gets new look - MLive.com
Key Systems Biology Components of Therasis Filter(TM) Lead to ... - PR Inside

MSU to spend $43.2M on Plant Science Expansion - WZZM 13

Posted: 30 Dec 2009 05:42 AM PST

EAST LANSING, Mich. (Lansing State Journal)- In a time of campus-wide budget cuts, Michigan State University is moving ahead with construction of the first major new building on its campus in nearly a decade.

The Plant Science Expansion will be a four-story glass and brick structure at the southwest corner of Bogue Street and Wilson Road. The price tag is estimated at $43.2 million.

Construction is scheduled to begin in May 2010 and finish by late 2011.

"Why invest here when you're cutting everything else?" said David DeWitt, associate dean for budgets and research in the College of Natural Science. "I think the idea that the university has come to grips with is, when you have budget cuts, you can't just cut everything and go on business as usual."

The university isn't just cutting, he said, but realigning and making strategic investments in its strongest programs.

"One of the things we're good at and one of the things we're going to be good at in the future is plant science research. So we're investing in that," he said. "You have to invest in your future."

Plant science is a research area that extends across departments and disciplines, and, over the past few years, a lucrative one for the university.

Crowded area

There's MSU's $50 million share of the Department of Energy-funded Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC), the $2.8 million stimulus grant for research on medicinal plants, $1 million from the Department of Agriculture for work on developing perennial wheat and other, mostly smaller awards.

"We've been very successful, and, when you're very successful, you need more space," DeWitt said. "The GLBRC required us to hire 100 new people. That's a big investment, so we're kind of crowded."

At 90,000 square feet, much of it devoted to open-layout lab space and plant growth chambers, the Plant Science Expansion will alleviate that crowding.

It also will provide spaces better fitted to contemporary research.

Plant biology professor Robin Buell's current lab was "designed for people to do physiology or biochemistry, where people stand and work at a bench."

Which isn't what Buell and her team do. Their work is computational, mapping plant genomes.

"Almost everyone who works for me just sits at a computer all day," she said. "There's just not very good work space for that."

Multi-disciplinary

The new building will physically join the Plant Biology and Plant and Soil Sciences buildings.

By doing so, university officials hope it will also foster greater interaction among researchers and greater levels of cross-disciplinary collaboration.

"The life sciences are becoming more and more multi-disciplinary," said Christoph Benning, a professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology whose work focuses, in part, on the use of algae for biofuels.

"We are looking not just at single genes and single processes, but the whole plant, the whole organism at the systems level. That requires teams of people. So we want to foster an environment that facilitates that."

Additional Facts
At a glance
Construction on the Plant Science Expansion is set to begin in May 2010 and finish in December 2011. The 90,000-square-foot building will be the first major new building on campus since the Biomedical and Physical Sciences building was completed in 2002. It will be located at the southwest corner of Bogue Street and Wilson Road.

By Matthew Miller, Lansing State Journal

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Teacher played football at OSU, was TARTA aide - Toledo Blade

Posted: 30 Dec 2009 03:26 AM PST

Gerald J. Bowsher II, 72, a former science teacher and coach at St. Francis de Sales High School who became TARTA's director of human resources after a corporate career, died Sunday in Mercy St. Vincent Medical Center of a heart attack.

His duties at the Toledo Area Regional Transit Authority the last 15 years included contract negotiations with labor unions.

"He liked that challenge," his son Thomas said. "He liked thinking about how he was going to work through these negotiating pieces, always with a sensitivity to the human factor."

James Gee, TARTA general manager, said: "He was extremely intelligent and had a great sense of what was right and what was wrong.

"He truly believed in fighting for those who were on the side of the issue he felt deserved it," Mr. Gee said.

For instance, he believed TARTA should pay when valid injury claims were filed against it, attorney Cormac DeLaney said. He also believed that the transit agency should defend taxpayer money and hold fast against less-than-legitimate claims.

"He expected excellence from his staff and the attorneys who represented him," said Mr. DeLaney, who was a biology student of Mr. Bowsher's at St. Francis.

Mr. Bowsher, of South Toledo, received a master of science degree in educational psychology from Indiana University in the late 1960s. Afterward, he spent nearly 20 years at RCA, including three years as manager of industrial relations in Taiwan. He later worked in New York City as RCA director of labor relations and, finally, corporate director of management and organization development.

He was a consultant for the state of Indiana for several years and negotiated contracts on the state's behalf with employee unions.

Mr. Bowsher grew up in South Toledo and was a graduate of Central Catholic High School, where he was a star football player. He was a 1961 graduate of Ohio State University, attending on a football scholarship and playing left guard for Woody Hayes.

"That was the time of his life," his daughter, Kristen, said. "He worshipped Woody Hayes, and Ohio State football was it to him."

He practiced the lessons learned from the legendary coach for the rest of his life, his son Thomas said: "You work hard. You're honest, and you're committed. There's no doing something 50 percent, 70 percent. At a minimum it's 100 percent."

Mr. Bowsher taught biology at St. Francis until the late 1960s. In 1965, he received a National Science Foundation grant for summer study at Yale University. He also was an assistant football and wrestling coach.

"He was an enthusiastic teacher," Mr. DeLaney recalled. "He tried to instill concepts of personal introspection regarding science and evolution."

He was a member of the Toledo Club, where he swam regularly. He was a longtime member of the Maumee River Yacht Club and enjoyed cruising the river or sitting aboard his boat with his loyal St. Bernard, Kuuipo, and watching the water and the river islands.

He was formerly married to the late Connie Bowsher.

Surviving are his sons, Gerald III and Thomas Bowsher; daughter, Kristen Bowsher; sister, Sharon Lewis; brother, Larry Bowsher, and a grandson.

The body will be in the Coyle Funeral Home after 2 p.m. today, where a Scripture service will be at 7 p.m. The funeral will be at 10 a.m. tomorrow in Immaculate Conception Church.

The family suggests tributes to the church or Cherry Street Mission.

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Key Systems Biology Components of Therasis Filter(TM) Lead to ... - Yahoo Finance

Posted: 29 Dec 2009 05:29 AM PST

NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwire - 12/29/09) - Therasis Co-Founder, Andrea Califano, Ph.D., and Wei Keat Lim, Ph.D., Head of Computational Systems Biology at Therasis, along with a team of scientists at Columbia University, have reported in the journal Nature the identification of two genes that, when simultaneously activated, cause the most lethal form of glioblastoma, an aggressive brain tumor. The findings were first published in an advanced online edition of Nature on December 23, 2009, http://www.nature.com/journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nature08712.pdf.

The genes were identified by reverse-engineering a map of the complex molecular interactions that occur within the actual tumor cells, also known as a cellular network, using advanced cancer systems biology algorithms. These computational methods and algorithms were developed in the laboratory of Dr. Califano, who is also the Director of the Joint Centers for Systems Biology and Associate Director of the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center at Columbia University Medical Center.

The team used one of the algorithms (ARACNe) to reconstruct the cellular network that controls the behavior of these tumors. Then, a second algorithm (MARINa) was used to identify the master regulators of the worst prognosis in glioblastoma from this network. This analysis pinpointed two genes, with no known prior association with brain cancer, as playing a key, synergistic role in determining the most aggressive properties of glioblastoma, including invasion of normal surrounding tissue and angiogenesis. ARACNe and several other algorithms are exclusively licensed to Therasis from Columbia University. Together, they form the computational foundation of the company's robust drug discovery platform, known as the Therasis Filter(TM).

The computational findings were confirmed by a follow-up validation study, in which the expression of these genes was found to be strongly correlated with increased mortality. Furthermore, the tumor network and genes' functions were confirmed both in cell lines and in mouse models. Expression of the two genes in neural stem cells caused them to display all the hallmarks of the most aggressive glioblastoma. Conversely, silencing these genes in aggressive human glioma cells, which are normally highly tumorigenic when transplanted in mice, completely blocked their ability to form tumors.

"This study validates the potential of the Therasis Filter(TM) to transform oncology drug discovery and development by enabling a comprehensive understanding of the inner regulatory interactions in actual tumor cells to guide target identification," commented Dr. Califano. "These findings of two new synergistic glioblastoma targets support our technology platform and will guide new approaches to combination therapy and associated diagnosis through targets and biomarkers that are causally, rather than statistically, associated with the tumors."

Dr. Stefan Catsicas, Chairman of the Tilocor Group, whose Tilocor Life Science arm has invested $12M into Therasis' Series A financing, added, "This study illustrates that scientific excellence is necessary to develop innovative treatments. The combined expertise of the founders and of the management of Therasis should allow the company to translate this excellence into clinical breakthroughs."

Rather than identifying therapies based solely on cytotoxicity, or ability to kill cancer cells, the Therasis Filter(TM) enables a more informed approach to drug development by determining key molecular targets and uncovering synergistic interactions within a cellular network. The subsequent reverse-mapping of the effects of a single agent or combination on these cellular activities affords a better understanding of the mode of action and specific toxicity of new treatments, as well as biomarkers of activity.

Therasis was recently founded by Drs. Riccardo Dalla Favera, Owen O'Connor, and Andrea Califano, leaders in basic, translational, and clinical oncology research. The company is developing an internal pipeline of oncology drug candidates and forming drug discovery partnerships with other pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies.

About the Therasis Filter(TM)

The Therasis Filter(TM) enables the identification of disease-specific alterations in the networks of molecular interactions that regulate cellular processes, allowing the rapid identification of new chemical entities and synergistic combinations that target these alterations. Beginning with high throughput screening of compound libraries, the Therasis Filter(TM) first collects a large number of molecular profiles of chemically-perturbed cells. These profiles are used to reconstruct accurate maps of molecular interactions, also known as "interactomes." The latter are experimentally validated and analyzed to identify disease-specific alterations in tumor-derived tissues, compounds targeting these alterations and biomarkers complementing clinical development. Interactomes are also effective in characterizing drug mechanisms of action, supporting both drug rescuing and drug repositioning efforts.

About Therasis

Therasis, Inc. is a new drug discovery company developing oncology therapeutics for use as single agents or in combination therapy. The Company's proprietary technology, the Therasis Filter(TM), represents a paradigm shift in the ability to discover therapeutic targets, their chemical inhibitors and associated biomarkers. This platform integrates world-class expertise in high throughput screening, systems biology, cancer genetics and clinical research. Therasis plans to leverage its discovery engine to identify new chemical entities for internal development and to forge collaborations with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies on drug repositioning.

Therasis' technology platform was developed at Columbia University by internationally recognized thought leaders in cancer genetics, cancer systems biology and cancer therapeutic development. The Company is funded by Tilocor Life Science. Learn more at www.therasis.com.

About Tilocor

Tilocor has established a small group of innovation-driven companies, working synergistically to better understand unmet medical needs and the new technologies that can be used to address them. Co-founded by Professor Stefan Catsicas, former Vice-President of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (Lausanne), the Tilocor Group promotes an entrepreneurial approach adapted to the long-term needs of the life science sector. Currently, Tilocor companies focus on inflammation, infectious diseases and cancer with specific therapeutic agents that include intracellular peptides, human antibodies and small chemical entities. More information is available at www.tilocor.com

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Ottawa Hills High School's original wing gets new look - MLive.com

Posted: 30 Dec 2009 05:42 AM PST

By Kym Reinstadler | The Grand Rapids Press

December 30, 2009, 8:38AM

GRAND RAPIDS -- It's extreme makeover time for two classrooms in Ottawa Hills High School's original wing, now being renovated for the School of Business, Leadership and Entrepreneurship.

A home-economics-room-turned-biology lab is being remade as the business school's new presentation room. A computer lab is being remade into a business lounge. Over winter break, carpeting is replacing asbestos-laced floor tiles. Walls are being painted, and in coming weeks, new moveable white boards and two PolyVision "smart boards" will be installed, Assistant Principal Michael Pasco said.

Renovations are being funded by an undisclosed gift from business partner Amway. Steelcase also is providing interactive technology and new furniture.

Thirty freshmen, who work on wireless laptop computers, are enrolled in the new Centers of Innovation program, which will add a grade a year.

E-mail Kym Reinstadler: kreinstadler@grpress.com

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Key Systems Biology Components of Therasis Filter(TM) Lead to ... - PR Inside

Posted: 29 Dec 2009 05:37 AM PST

2009-12-29 14:40:51 -

NEW YORK, NY -- (Marketwire) -- 12/29/09 -- Therasis Co-Founder, Andrea Califano, Ph.D., and Wei Keat Lim, Ph.D., Head of Computational Systems Biology at Therasis, along with a team of scientists at Columbia University, have reported in the journal Nature the identification of two genes that, when simultaneously activated, cause the most lethal form of glioblastoma, an aggressive brain tumor. The findings were first published in an advanced online edition of Nature on December 23, 2009, www.nature.com/journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nature08712.pdf :

The genes were identified by reverse-engineering a map of the complex molecular interactions that occur within the actual tumor cells, also known as a cellular network, using advanced cancer systems biology algorithms.
These computational methods and algorithms were developed in the laboratory of Dr. Califano, who is also the Director of the Joint Centers for Systems Biology and Associate Director of the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center at Columbia University Medical Center.

About the Therasis Filter(TM)

The Therasis Filter(TM) enables the identification of disease-specific alterations in the networks of molecular interactions that regulate cellular processes, allowing the rapid identification of new chemical entities and synergistic combinations that target these alterations.
Beginning with high throughput screening of compound libraries, the Therasis Filter(TM) first collects a large number of molecular profiles of chemically-perturbed cells. These profiles are used to reconstruct accurate maps of molecular interactions, also known as "interactomes." The latter are experimentally validated and analyzed to identify disease-specific alterations in tumor-derived tissues, compounds targeting these alterations and biomarkers complementing clinical development. Interactomes are also effective in characterizing drug mechanisms of action, supporting both drug rescuing and drug repositioning efforts.

About Therasis

About Tilocor

Tilocor has established a small group of innovation-driven companies, working synergistically to better understand unmet medical needs and the new technologies that can be used to address them. Co-founded by Professor Stefan Catsicas, former Vice-President of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (Lausanne), the Tilocor Group promotes an entrepreneurial approach adapted to the long-term needs of the life science sector.
Currently, Tilocor companies focus on inflammation, infectious diseases and cancer with specific therapeutic agents that include intracellular peptides, human antibodies and small chemical entities. More information is available at www.tilocor.com :

Therasis contact:
Michelle Linn
Linnden Communications
T. +1 508 362 3087
M. +1 774 696 3803
Email Contact :

For European Media:
Christophe Lamps
Dynamics Group
T. +41 22 308 62 22
M. +41 79 476 26 87
Email Contact :

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Biology

Wednesday, December 30, 2009