BioSpectrumIndia - the business of biotech

The Nobel Prizes for the current year, which were announced recently, have stirred the scientific circles. Significantly, the prizes in Chemistry and Physiology/Medicine were awarded for work at the molecular/gene level having long-term implications for the human health. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2004 "for the discovery of ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation" jointly to Aaron Ciechanover and Avram Hershko from the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, and Irwin Rose from the University of California, Irvine, USA. Ciechanover and Hershko are the first Israelis to win a Nobel Prize for science.

Amongst the galaxy of scientists of Indian origin working abroad and making India proud is Dr Mahesh Kumar, the senior director of Fort Dodge Animal Health division at Wyeth, which is one of the global leaders in pharmaceuticals, consumer and animal health care products.

Agri
"Scientists have an obligation to explain science"

Continuing our series of "Biotech Gurus", in this issue we focus on Dr Channapatna S Prakash, the founder of the highly successful and popular agricultural biotechnology website—Agbioworld. He moderates daily Internet discussion group and newsletter "AgBioView" which is read by more than 4,000 experts in 55 countries.

Many "biotech gurus" of Indian origin have been making waves in recent years all over the world. As the segment is new in India, these remarkable personalities have not got the attention they deserve in "India Shining". BioSpectrum will attempt to cover the information gap that exists in enabling India’s nascent biotechnology industry to learn from these experts. What better way than to start this new series with the redoubtable Dr Shanthu Shantharam, who pioneered the regulatory process of Bt cotton and supervised the first field trials of this crop in the United States in the mid-1980s.

Informatics
"We are contemplating to do not only biogenerics but also new molecules."

When you are an entrepreneur venturing in to a new field, problems and controversies become your middle name. And so is the case with Varaprasad Reddy, MD, Shantha Biotechnics Pvt Ltd. With a vision to provide cost effective healthcare products to the masses, he established Shantha Biotechnics in 1993. Although an electrical engineer, he triumphed against the initial skepticism, funding problems and regulatory issues to launch India’s first recombinant hepatitis B vaccine, Shanvac-B, in 1997.

Life Science scientists receive national awards

On 25 January 2004, when the President of India announced the Padma awards, the country’s scientific community reveled with joy. Acknowledging the importance and impact of biotechnology, four leading scientists of this field were honored for their contribution to life sciences.

Informatics
Data Manager

India has all the ingredients to conduct clinical trials to tap the $70 billion opportunity in clinical trials and clinical data management system. Providing the right inputs for the subjects is very essential as is doing good trials.

Agri
"Biological products difficult to predict and control"

"Understanding how a seed germinates is rather difficult, than to understand how a space shuttle lands on moon," believes Dr Rakesh Tuli, senior scientist, NBRI, Lucknow. This quote gives an insight into the person who has many firsts to his credit—cloning an agriculturally important gene 12 years ago, synthesizing two new Bt genes recently and then developing an innovative technology transfer method for the industry. It was a room full of research documents, a table full with papers, some samples of on-going research work and amidst all these Dr Rakesh Tuli shared his views with BioSpectrum about the science he delivered to the industry and the challenges and future of agribiotechnology in India.