Stem cells have been a particularly shiny beacon in regenerative medicine due to the ever-growing observations of their therapeutic benefits in the laboratory.
The speed at which the medical device industry is changing and evolving is perhaps unrivalled in the life sciences industry. Medical device manufacturers are experiencing disruption from small companies and startups entering the market; tech giants, like Amazon, are investigating and investing in medical device expertise; and cybersecurity concerns are on the rise.
Regenerative medicine's potential to revolutionise health care is now a well-told story, but it is a story still in progress - one in which success has been limited, and happy endings are few and far between.
History of stem cell regenerative medicine Tissue regeneration is one of the hallmarks that differentiate living organisms from machines. Stem cell therapy and regenerative medicine has a long history in applied medicine. The first successful bone marrow transplant was performed in 1956 by Dr Edward Donnall Thomas. This milestone was recognised by the award of a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1990. Tissue grafting and organ transplantation can also be considered forms of regenerative medicine if performed between tissue-compatible donors and recipients.
Following strong results from its Phase III acute graft versus host disease trial, Mesoblast's objective is to be first to market in the United States with a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) - approved allogeneic mesenchymal lineage cell product.
As the regulatory framework for medicinal cannabis in Australia becomes more permissive for both producers and patients, there is an opportunity to develop a robust manufacturing and production industry to meet supply in both domestic and international markets. The ability of the Australian biotechnology industry to capitalise on this opportunity will depend on the ability of stakeholders to navigate the complex regulatory obstacles presented by overlapping federal and state legislation. Furthermore, Australian producers will also have to face strong competition from well-established players in the United States, Canada and Israel to establish a foothold in this booming global industry.
A leading agribusiness innovator has teamed up with an innovative start-up to create accurate and actionable grain-crop nutrition maps.
Personalised medicine is a move away from a traditional one-size-fits-all approach to a customised approach to medical treatment, in which appropriate therapies are selected based on a patient's genetic profile or other molecular and/or cellular analysis.
The value of the agriculture sector to the Australian economy is in excess of $60 billion, with the bulk of products - such as meat, dairy, wool and wheat - going to export markets. With the enormous challenge of global food security, it is estimated that food production will need to be increased by more than 70 per cent to meet the needs of the predicted 9.7 billion global population by 2050.
While listed medical technology (medtech) companies in Australia are typically in the early stages of development - with market capitalisations below $300 million - Australia's investment market has a track record of supporting the commercialisation of some of the most successful medtech companies in the world, such as Cochlear and ResMed.
The ability to propagate human cells ex vivo is the basis for significant advancements ranging from fundamental cell biology to medicine. Human pluripotent stem (PS) cells, which include human embryonic stem (ES) cells and induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, have generated substantial interest due to their capacity to self-renew indefinitely and differentiate into almost any specialised cell type. These unique properties make human PS cells a potentially unlimited supply of cells for several applications involving regenerative medicine, drug discovery, toxicology, disease modelling and understanding fundamental cell biology.
Professor Paul Young and his team from the Australian Infectious Diseases Research Centre at the University of Queensland, heads a laboratory with expertise in molecular virology. They are currently exploring the underlying mechanisms of severe disease caused by the dengue virus, and developing both therapeutic and vaccine control strategies for a range of viral pathogens.
Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the most significant infectious diseases in the world today. According to the 2014 World Health Organization (WHO) annual report, there were an estimated 9.6 million new cases and 1.5 million fatalities in that year, and one-third of the world’s population is now infected with the etiological agent Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Due to successful control strategies in the 1980s, the current risk of Australians contracting this disease is low, but we are not totally immune to it, with around 1500 new cases diagnosed in Australia in 2014. Of more immediate concern is that TB remains a major threat to our nearest neighbours, including Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam.
On November 19 2015, the United States Food and Drug Administration (US-FDA) approved AquaBounty Technologies Inc. application for the use of the AquAdvantage salmon for human consumption. The AquAdvantage salmon, an Atlantic salmon genetically engineered (GE) to express the Chinook salmon growth hormone gene and thus grow faster and more efficiently, was developed in 1992 (Du et al., 1992). These salmon are bred to be sterile and are farmed in land-locked aquaculture facilities with multiple barriers for physical containment. Scientists and scientific bodies have overwhelmingly welcomed the FDAs decision after extensive reviews of food and environmental safety and endorsed AquAdvantage salmon as a safe and more sustainable product than existing farmed salmon, which helps to relieve the pressure of overfishing on wild populations.
A recent catalogue search of the State Library of Victoria using 'biotechnology' as the search term revealed over 1,000 entries. Searching for 'Australian biotechnology' showed 98 entries. However when one searched that same term for articles, then 11,000 entries are found. This alone indicates how established biotechnology has become in the last 30 to 50 years.
When I first started compiling the INDEX of ASXlisted healthcare companies for the AusBiotech Journal in 2004 there were few publications that provided potential investors with information that aggregated data in the ever-growing, new ASX listings in the healthcare sector.
