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TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Stent maker IDev Tech raises $25M (VentureWire)
• Xytis gets $15M for brain-injury drugs (VentureWire)
• Diagnostic maker Iris Biotech plans to go public, launch breast-cancer test (Edgar)
• RiverVest Venture Partners raises $75M life-science fund (release)
• Concentric Medical names Maria Sainz CEO (release)

[Note: I'm a little sad to announce that this will be my last life-science briefing at VentureBeat, although with luck, it won't be the end of my time here. Starting Monday, I'll be blogging regularly on the drug industry and healthcare over at BNET Industries, a new CNET venture, so drop by if you can. (Preparing for that move is the main reason non-briefing posts have been scarce recently.) I still hope to post here occasionally as well, since covering below-the-radar startups has been a blast, and I'm not ready to give it up quite yet.

It's been a great year -- my first VentureBeat post was on April 3, 2007 -- and I want to thank Matt for the opportunity to join you here, and all our regular readers and commenters for your time and your insights. As journalists, we're only as good as our sources and readers, and you guys have helped in countless ways to make me look much smarter than I really am. --D.P.H.]

Stent maker IDev Tech raises $25M – IDev Technologies, a Houston medical-device startup, raised $25 million in a third funding round, VentureWire reports. The company is developing a new type of stent for use in propping open the liver’s bile ducts .

The company’s existing investors, a group that includes Bay City Capital, Heron Capital, PTB Sciences and RiverVest Venture Partners, provided the funding. IDev had previously raised $24 million, according to VW.

Xytis gets $15M for brain-injury drugs – Irvine, Calif.-based Xytis, a biotech focused on disorders of the central nervous system, raised $15 million in an extension of its second funding round, VentureWire reports. Its backers included Atlas Venture, CDC Innovation, Sanderling Ventures and Ventech.

The company says it was founded in 2005 from the merger of Xytis Pharmaceuticals and Remergent. (Sounds more to me like Xytis swallowed Remergent, but they’re free to describe it however they’d like.) Its lead drug candidate, XY2405, blocks a cellular protein called the Bradykinin B2 receptor, a signaling molecule thought to promote inflammation.

Xytis is testing the drug as a potential treatment for traumatic brain injury; the molecule is currently in mid-stage, phase II trials. The company is also testing an antidepressant in early-stage trials.

Xytis raised half the money last August, then received the second $7.5 million in April, the company told VentureWire. It has previously raised $24.5 million in its current incarnation, and its “predecessor companies” pulled in $6.5 million.

Diagnostic maker Iris Biotech plans to go public, launch breast-cancer test – Santa Clara, Calif.-based Iris Biotechnologies, a developer of molecular diagnostic tests, is preparing to go public, VentureWire reports. The company plans a small offering on the OTC Bulletin Board — if I’m reading its latest SEC filing correctly, its existing shareholders will raise about $1.1 million, with no proceeds headed to the company  — and hopes to launch a breast-cancer test later this year.

Iris plans to use chips to measure gene activity in breast cancer, with the hope of predicting the odds that a surgically removed tumor will recur and, eventually, helping patients and doctors customize cancer treatment from an early stage. The company claims that it will be competitive with Genomic Health and Agendia, two companies with similar tests for predicting breast-cancer recurrence.

There’s something a little odd about Iris’ disclosures in the SEC forms, though. Iris doesn’t describe its technology, the genes it will test or how it settled on them in any detail, and spends almost as much time talking about its database of patient information and related computer technology as it does about its tests. While it may consider some or all of that information a trade secret — and disclosure requirements may well be looser for such a small offering — it’s still kind of unusual for a startup to ask outside investors to put up their money essentially on faith.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• AGI Dermatics takes in $5M for skincare products (release)
• Myconostica raises £3.9 for fungal diagnostics (GenomeWeb)
  
• Germany’s Noxxon gets €1M grant for aptamer drugs (release)

AGI Dermatics takes in $5M for skincare products – Freeport, N.Y.-based AGI Dermatics, a startup concentrated on skincare products, raised $5 million in a new funding round. Investors included Trevi Health Ventures and Spring Mountain Capital.

AGI makes cosmetic ingredients and is working on developing topical pharmaceutical lotions as well. Its leading drug candidate is called T4N5 Liposome Lotion, which AGI says includes a DNA-repair enzyme intended to repair ultraviolet damage to the skin. The company is currently testing the product as a preventive treatment for skin cancer.

Germany’s Noxxon gets €1M grant for aptamer drugs — Noxxon, a German biotech aiming to make drugs from nucleic-acid snippets called aptamers, received a grant from Germany’s Federal Ministry of Education and Research. The €1 million ($1.6 million) grant is intended to support Noxxon’s drug-discovery program, which we covered at greater length last May.

Myconostica raises £3.9M for fungal diagostics – Myconostica, a U.K. biotech that spun out of the University of Manchester, raised £3.9 million ($7.7 million) in a third funding round, GenomeWeb reports. Investors included Amphion Innovations, Nexus Medical Partners, and Innoven Partenaires.

The company is working on rapid diagnostic tests for life-threatening fungal infections. Its first product is a test for several types of fungal infection that is nearing approval in Europe, and which Myconostica thinks could receive U.S. approval by the fourth quarter.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• OptiMedica takes in $16M for eye-treatment lasers (release)
• Genome analyzer BioNanomatrix raises $5M (release)
• Heart diagnostic startup Aviir gets another $1.5M (VBLS exclusive)
• Pharmaca, integrative-pharmacy chain, draws $20M (release)
• LifeWatch, cardiac-monitoring device maker, withdraws IPO (IPOhome)
• Jerry DeVries, Steven Whitlock join PTV Sciences as venture partners (VentureWire)

OptiMedica takes in $16M for eye-treatment lasers – OptiMedica, a Santa Clara, Calif., medical-device maker, raised $16 million in a third funding round. Investors included Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Alloy Ventures and DAG Ventures.

The startup makes and sells an eye-treatment laser system called Pascal — the acronym stands for “pattern scan laser” — which is approved for treating of retinal diseases such as diabetic retinopathy and other conditions involving the abnormal growth of blood vessels that can leak and obscure vision. The laser works by “photocoagulation,” which simply means it burns and fuses tissue at the point of focus — sealing off blood vessels, for instance, healing tears in the retina or even reattaching a retina that’s come loose.

Genome analyzer BioNanomatrix raises $5M – This item is now a standalone post here.

Heart diagnostic startup Aviir gets another $1.5M – Palo Alto, Calif.-based Aviir, a biotech focused on heart diagnostics, raised an additional $1.5 million as a follow-on to its second funding round, the company’s chief operating officer, Avi Kulkarni, said. The money is an equity investment related to a still-undisclosed partnership with a large pharmaceutical company, he told me.

Aviir is still in stealth mode, as we noted last year when we first wrote about its use of Stanford technology for detection and monitoring of cardiovascular disease. Kulkarni did offer a few additional details, telling me, for instance, that the company’s name is actually an acronym that stands for “atherosclerotic venous inflammation and insulin resistance.”

That, plus the fact that Aviir is working on what Kulkarni said is a “multiple biomarker panel assay” for heart disease, suggests to me that the company plans on measuring the levels of various proteins, probably from blood, in order to get a more precise picture of stressors such as inflammation and insulin resistance that might lead to heart problems. (”Insulin resistance” is an interesting choice, since that’s the cause — or the effect, perhaps — of type 2 diabetes, which is also linked to heart trouble.)

Aviir raised $11.5 million of a planned $25 million round last September, it disclosed in an SEC form now available online (PDF link) via the California Department of Corporations. The remainder of that round will become available when the company hits unspecified milestones.

For a look at the sort of thing Aviir is probably working on, check out this 2007 paper from Physiological Genomics, in which a research team from Stanford and Aviir detail the use of inflammatory proteins known as chemokines to identify patients with atherosclerosis. On the more whimsical side, a self-described friend of the company’s founders describes what he knows about Aviir on his blog, and also posts a odd homemade video “commercial” that suggests the company will be predicting lifetime disease risks for infants.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Paris-based Stentys takes $18M for “bifurcated” stents (release)
• Blood analyzer IntelliDx raises $22M (PDF release)
• Cancer-test biotech Calderome changes name to VeraCyte (VentureWire)
• Predictive Biosciences names Peter Klemm as CEO (release)

Paris-based Stentys takes $18M for “bifurcated” stents – Stentys, a Paris-based medical device maker, raised $18 million in a second funding round. The company is developing “bifurcated” stents intended to prop open clogged arteries at blood-vessel junctions.

The startup said the funding will allow it to complete clinical trials of its stents and to win European regulatory approval for them. Stentys doesn’t seem to have given any indication whether or when it might seek approval in the U.S. or other markets as well.

Scottish Equity Partners and Sofinnova Partners provided the funding.

Blood analyzer IntelliDx raises $22M –It’s starting to look like Diabetes Week here at VentureBeat LifeScience.

IntelliDx (no Web site), a Boston Santa Clara, Calif., startup with a new type of blood-sugar analyzer for hospitalized diabetics, raised $21.5 million in a fourth funding round (PDF link). Investors included HLM Venture Partners, 3i Ventures, Giza Ventures, Ascend Ventures, Aurum Ventures, Sequel Venture Partners and Hunt BioVentures.

IntelliDx makes a chemical sensor-based blood analyzer for use in hospital intensive-care units. Much like the Luminous Medical spectroscopic blood-glucose analyzer we covered yesterday, the IntelliDx device aims to monitor blood sugar hourly in diabetic patients. The idea, again, is to keep a closer eye on hyperglycemia in a critical-care setting, since runaway blood glucose often increases the chance of complications and lengthier hospital stays.

Cancer-test biotech Calderome changes name to VeraCyte – Calderome, a stealthy cancer-test startup in South San Francisco, has changed its name to VeraCyte (no Web site), VentureWire reports. The new name presumably reflects the company’s focus on cell-based cancer diagnostics, as we described last week.

The VentureWire story goes on to reprise VeraCyte’s $12 million fundraising, which we also covered last week. VeraCyte has two employees, and recently extended job offers to three other individuals, the news service reported.

CORRECTED: The IntelliDx item initially located the company in Boston, not Santa Clara. The company’s release was datelined Boston because it originated with HLM Ventures. Apologies for the error.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Luminous Medical raises $24M for automated glucose monitoring (release)
• Alimera Sciences gets $30M for eye-disease drug (release)
• Vaccine maker LigoCyte draws $28M (release)
• Heartbeat tracker CardioNet trims IPO, aims for listing today (IPOhome)
• Axial Biotech takes in $6M for spinal diagnostics (release)
• Insulin bioengineer enGene receives $6.4M (release)
• GlucoLight raises funding for, well, glucose monitoring (release)
• Germany’s InflaRx gets seed funding for sepsis work (release)
• Cell imager Amnis pulls in $3.5M (VentureWire)
• Korea Bone Bank gets funding for bone transplants (release)

Luminous Medical raises $24M for automated glucose monitoring – Carlsbad, Calif.-based Luminous Medical, a medical-device maker, raised $23.5 million in a second funding round. Investors included Adams Street Partners, RiverVest Venture Partners, Finistere Ventures, De Novo Ventures and Latterell Venture Partners.

Luminous is developing an automated blood-sugar sensor for diabetic patients being treated in hospital intensive-care units and operating rooms. According to the company, keeping a tight rein on blood-glucose levels, which can soar or crash unexpectedly in diabetics, helps prevent complications while shortening hospital stays and reducing the risk of death.

Measuring such tight control, however, typically requires manually checking blood-glucose levels every 30 to 60 minutes, the company says. The Luminous device, by contrast, uses infrared spectroscopy — a technique that identifies particular molecules by measuring which wavelengths of light they absorb — to measure glucose and other blood chemicals non-invasively.

The company licensed its technology from InLight Solutions of Albuquerque, N.M., which previously invested $60 million in the technology. The device has not been approved by the FDA.

Axial Biotech takes in $6M for spinal diagnostics – Axial Biotech, a Salt Lake City diagnostic-test maker, raised $6 million as part of its second funding round. Investors included Johnson & Johnson Development, vSpring Capital and Ohio Biotech Group.

Axial, founded in 2002 by a group of spinal surgeons and geneticists, is an odd hybrid of biotech and devices. The company aims to produce tests that will predict and measure the severity of spinal problems such as scoliosis, as well as unspecified “motion-preserving technologies” — presumably an alternative to the stigmatizing back braces that orthopedists have long inflicted on children with the condition.

Insulin bioengineer enGene receives $6.4M – Canada’s enGene, a Vancouver biotech looking for ways to jump-start natural insulin production in diabetics, raised $6.4 million in a first round of funding. Investors included Saad Investments, Masa Life Science Ventures and private investors.

EnGene has an audacious — which is to say, of course, also quite chancy — approach to diabetes, in which the immune system attacks and kills insulin-producing “beta cells” in the pancreas (type 1 diabetes) or the body grows desensitized to insulin and requires higher levels (type 2 diabetes). In either case, patients often require insulin shots to maintain blood-sugar levels necessary or proper metabolism.

EnGene proposes to engineer cells in the small intestine — known as “K cells” — to produce insulin themselves. The advantage of this technique lies in the fact that K cells, like beta cells, respond to sugar levels in the gut, although they normally secrete a separate molecule. Once bioengineered to produce insulin as well, these cells could help regulate blood sugar automatically much the way beta cells normally do.

Of course, gene therapy has, in general, been a great disappointment so far, so there’s no shortage of uncertainty associated with this sort of technique. EnGene has tested its technique in mice, but not yet in humans. The startup plans to seek a second round of funding in the second half.

Alimera Sciences gets $30M for eye-disease drug – Alimera Sciences, an Alpharetta, Ga., drug developer with a focus on eye disease, raised $30 million in a third funding round. The company will now take a majority stake in its drug for diabetic macular edema, a vision-degrading complication of diabetes, which Alimera is developing with its partner pSividia.

We’ve written before about Alimera, which is presumably still contemplating an IPO this fall. All five of the company’s existing VC backers participated in the round: BA Venture Partners, Domain Associates, Intersouth Partners, Polaris Venture Partners and Venrock Associates.

Vaccine maker LigoCyte draws $28M – LigoCyte Pharmaceuticals, a Bozeman, Mont., biotech focused on new vaccines against infectious disease, raised $28 million in a third funding round. Investors included Forward Ventures, JAFCO, Novartis Venture Fund, Fidelity Biosciences, MedImmune Ventures, Athenian Venture Partners and MC Life Sciences Ventures.

The company is developing new vaccines using “virus-like particles” — usually structural viral proteins, minus the replication machinery packed in DNA or RNA — against gastroenteritis, anthrax and flu. It is also working on antibody drugs against inflammatory disease.

TODAY’S HEADLINES

• Cantimer takes in $2M for dehydration diagnostics (VentureWire)
• Recodagen launches, takes aim at cancer (release)
• Juniper Diagnostics spins out of ChemSensing (VentureWire)

Cantimer takes in $2M for dehydration diagnostics –The mystery of Menlo Park, Calif.-based Cantimer has resolved a bit. We wrote about this stealthy company back in December and reached the conclusion that the company was developing a particular type of nanosensor intended to identify water levels in human tissue.

Now VentureWire reports that Cantimer is doing just that, using a polymer-based sensor for measuring dehydration in saliva. The company plans to market the device in sports medicine and pediatric and elderly care as well as to hospitals and emergency rooms.

The startup also just raised $2 million in a first funding round. AWT Private Investments and angel investors provided the cash.

Recodagen launches, takes aim at cancer – Recodagen (no Web site), a newly launched Seattle biotech working on new cancer drugs, raised an undisclosed sum in a first funding round. The sum falls in the $2 million to $5 million range, according to John Cook’s blog.

Investors included Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Amgen Ventures, ARCH Venture Partners, OVP Venture Partners and WRF Capital.

Recodagen was incubated by Seattle’s Accelerator. The company’s technology originated at Washington State University.

Juniper Diagnostics spins out of ChemSensing with new funding– ChemSensing, a Champaign, Ill., developer of sensor arrays, is spinning out Juniper Diagnostics to commercialize its technology for detecting bacteria via breath, VentureWire reports. The new startup will launch with a multi-million-dollar funding round provided by Mariner Equity Management and ChemSensing.

Juniper’s technology involves panels of reactive dyes that change color in response to chemical exposure — in this case, to gases emitted by certain classes of bacteria in the breath of patients with tuberculosis or pneumonia. The company expects that FDA approval of the device may take 18 months to two years.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Affinergy gets $3M in grants for biological “linkers” (release)
• Specialty pharma EUSA raises $50M, spends $23M for public biotech Cytogen (release)
• Calderome takes in $12M for cancer diagnostics (peHUB)
• Pulse Health raises $2M for handheld free-radical device (release)
  
• LifeMasters takes in $15M for wellness, disease-management programs (release)
• Dubai Techno Park launched $300MVC fund for life sciences, other sectors (release)

Affinergy gets $3M in grants for biological “linkers” – Affinergy, a Duke University spinout in Research Triangle Park, N.C., received grants worth more than $3 milllion to support development of biological “linker” molecules with potential uses in coatings for medical devices and the development of new therapeutics. The grants were awarded by the federal National Institutes of Health through its small-business innovation research program.

The startup is developing biological molecules that can selectively bind various substances to particular surfaces. Such linkage molecules could, for instance, attach healing growth factors to surgical meshes or other implanted biomaterials or help target drugs at particular cell-surface proteins. The company hasn’t described its goals in much detail, although it said one of the grants is for work aimed at accelerating a patient’s natural healing process.

Specialty pharma EUSA raises $50M, spends $23M for public biotech Cytogen – In today’s man-bites-dog news, the venture-backed specialty pharma EUSA Pharma agreed to acquire the publicly traded biotech Cytogen for $22.6 million. The EUSA release is here; Cytogen has its own release here.

In one sense, the news isn’t terribly surprising, as Cytogen effectively put itself up for sale last November when it announced it was “reviewing strategic alternatives.” The twist here is that EUSA is taking the biotech private — a sign of just how far Cytogen’s fortunes have fallen since the heady days of the 1999-2000 biotech bubble, when its stock almost touched $200 a share. EUSA, which has offices in Doylestown, Pa., and Oxford, England, is offering 62 cents a share, a 35 percent premium over Cytogen’s closing price yesterday of 46 cents.

On the business front, however, it’s hard to say that the combination will be much more exciting than either company has been individually. Both EUSA and Cytogen traffic in a range of largely unrelated drugs for pain and cancer treatment.

EUSA raised $50 million to finance the cash transaction, for working capital and to restructure Cytogen. Investors included TVM Capital, Essex Woodlands, 3i, Goldman Sachs, Advent Venture Partners, SV Life Sciences, NeoMed and NovaQuest.

Calderome takes in $12M for cancer diagnostics – Calderome (no Web site), a South San Francisco, Calif., developer of cancer diagnostics, has taken in $11.9 million of a $23 million first funding round, peHUB reports. (peHUB identifies the company as located in Menlo Park, Calif., but two Calderome job postings on Biospace indicate its headquarters are actually in South San Francisco.)

In fact, I’m loving job listings at the moment, because the company also advertised one of those positions on Craigslist here. According to that listing:

Calderome, Inc. is an early stage cancer diagnostics company addressing the emerging opportunities in personalized medicine. The Company’s strategic vision is to develop a novel molecular cytology approach to improve the diagnosis of cancer, saving patients thousands of unnecessary surgeries every year. The company has spent the last year validating its business model with key stakeholders: physicians, patients and payers and has recently closed a significant round of private equity financing with premier venture capital investors….

In other words, it sounds very much like the company is developing a cell-based diagnostic, possibly involving a test that can pick up tumor cells that circulate in the bloodstream, that can help diagnose cancer without the need for invasive biopsies. That’s merely speculation, however.

Investors in the round include Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, TPG Biotechnology Partners and Versant Ventures.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Allegro pulls in $4M for lung-cancer molecular diagnostics (release)
• Ocular bandage developer I-Therapeutix raises $6M (Mass High Tech)
• NanoBio gets last of $30M for skin-infection drugs (release)
• Cayenne Medical raises $15M for sports medicine (release)
• Aridis Pharma seeks $10M for oral-form drugs and vaccines (VentureWire)
• Neurosurgical device maker Nfocus Neuro acquires StarFire Medical (release)

Allegro pulls in $4M for lung-cancer molecular diagnostics – Boston’s Allegro Diagnostics, a biotech developing molecular diagnostics for lung cancer, raised $4 million in a first funding round. Investors included Kodiak Venture Partners, Catalyst Health Ventures and Boston University.

Allegro is commercializing gene-expression tests based on technology developed by two BU researchers, Jerome Brody and Avrum Spira. The company’s Web site and release don’t describe its technology in further detail. Allegro says the funding will allow it to begin human testing of its diagnostic.

Ocular bandage developer I-Therapeutix raises $6M – I-Therapeutix, a Waltham, Mass., device maker focused on using hydrogels as “liquid bandages” for ocular surgeries, expects to close a $6 million second funding round this month, Mass High Tech reports. Investors included Versant Ventures, SV Life Sciences, Pinnacle Ventures and angel investors.

Founded in 2006, I-Therapeutix plans to begin clinical trials of its hydrogel sealant in cataract surgery in the second quarer of this year. The product, called I-Zip, will be compared to ordinary corneal bandages. Ultimately, the startup plans to develop the hydrogel as a mechanism for delivering drugs directly to the eye.

Aridis Pharma seeks $10M for oral-form drugs and vaccines – Aridis Pharmaceuticals, a San Jose, Calif., drug and vaccine developer, aims to raise up to $10 million in a first funding round, VentureWire reports. The company was founded in 2003 by former executives of Aviron, which was acquired by MedImmune in 2002.

Aridis is working to stabilize drugs and vaccines that would otherwise require injections so that they can be delivered via inhalation or swallowing. Its lead candidates include a rotavirus vaccine, an antibody for cystic fibrosis and a new type of antibiotic.

Neurosurgical device maker Nfocus Neuro acquires StarFire Medical – Nfocus Neuromedical, a Palo Alto, Calif., device maker focused on treating hemorrhagic stroke, acquired StarFire Medical, a developer of minimally invasive devices for treating problems in the blood vessels serving the brain. The companies didn’t divulge financial details.

StarFire makes and sells balloon catheters for treating brain-vessel fistulas and aneurysms, both blood-vessel defects that can lead to uncontrolled bleeding. Nfocus makes a different type of device for treating these defects, although it doesn’t appear to have disclosed much about its particular approach.

NanoBio gets last of $30M for skin-infection drugs – NanoBio, an Ann Arbor, Mich., biotech developing new anti-infective drugs, raised the final $10 million of a $30 million equity funding that appears to be the company’s first. Perseus provided the funding. NanoBio’s lead compounds address herpes cold sores and nail fungus.

(UPDATED: See below.)

Another one bites the dust.

The saga of Precision Therapeutics, a Pittsburgh biotech developing what struck me last August as a particularly crude type of cancer-chemotherapy diagnostic, continues apace. In a tersely worded press release, the special-purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, Oracle Healthcare Acquisition said it has terminated its planned merger with Precision. The release blamed “currently prevailing market conditions” for the decision, which carries some fairly ominous consequences for both sides.

Oracle’s plight is fairly simple: The blank-check company will now dissolve itself and return the money it raised, minus expenses, to investors. For Precision, however, the outlook is much starker. The merger would not only have taken the company public, it would have left Precision with $120 million in cash, ample resources to bolster sales of its ChemoFx test and to develop new potential products.

Now, after getting jilted at the altar by Oracle and withdrawing its IPO, the startup is most likely almost out of cash. As of September 30, Precision had only $15.6 million in cash and cash equivalents and a working-capital deficit of $1.1 million against debts of $17 million — plus a burn rate of roughly $3 million a quarter. Those numbers don’t look good by any measure

The first real sign the merger was in trouble came just about two weeks ago, when Oracle and Precision effectively cut the overall size of the deal by 15 percent — never a good sign. Oracle’s decision to walk away remains murky to me given the complexity of the deal, and external market events might have somehow triggered provisions that made the acquisition untenable. But I can’t help wondering if the buyers may have simply concluded that Precision’s prospects weren’t at all what they once thought.

For more on these special-purpose acquisition outfits and their adventures in life science, see our coverage here.

UPDATE: Tom Salemi at the In Vivo blog has more:

A majority of the investors who buy into the SPAC through an initial public offering must approve of the merger. In deciding how to vote, investors must weigh whether or not they’d be better off cashing out now rather than letting their bets ride on a company like Precision Therapeutics.

In fact, according to Oracle’s annual filing, any shareholder that voted against the merger stood to receive roughly $8 for each of their shares if they were outvoted and the deal went through. To us, the question would appear to be simple. Were investors better off taking the $8 for their share or rolling the dice with shares in the new Precision Therapeutics shares?

Given the recent performance of IPOs, IN VIVO Blog is guessing the $8 was looking pretty good to Oracle investors.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Precision Thera merger with “blank check” Oracle Healthcare collapses (release)
• Sleep Solutions takes in $21M for sleep-apnea diagnostics (release)
• Trevena takes in $24M for drugs targeting G-proteins (release)
• “Specialty biotech” PanGenetics gets €23M for antibody drugs (release)
• Cancer-drug maker Unibioscreen pulls in €5M (release)
• Danish contract manufacturer CMC Biologics raises new funding (PDF release)
• Healthcare investor EDF Ventures postpones fourth fund (VentureWire)
• Global TB-drug alliance names former Sanofi-Aventis exec Jerome Premmeurer as CEO (release)
• Liquidia Tech names Neal Fowler as CEO (release)

(NOTE: Sorry for the minimal posting yesterday — I was at the Health 2.0 conference with extremely limited Internet connectivity. Normal posting resumes today.)

Precision Thera merger with “blank check” Oracle Healthcare collapses – This item is now a standalone post here.

Sleep Solutions takes in $21M for sleep-apnea diagnostics – Sleep Solutions, a Pasadena, Md., developer of diagnostic devices for sleep apnea, raised $20.5 million in a new funding round. Investors included TPG Biotechnology, MedVenture Associates, Emergent Ventures and Lava Ventures.

Sleep Solutions has developed a home-use diagnostic device for identifying sleep apnea, which are breathing difficulties during sleep. Diagnosing apnea has traditionally required patients to spend the night in a sleep laboratory. Left untreated, apnea can increase the risk of more serious problems, including stroke and heart attack.

Trevena takes in $24M for drugs targeting G-proteins – Trevena (no Web site), a Berwyn, Penn., biotech focused on a new area of drug discovery, raised $24 million in a first funding round. Investors included Alta Partners, Healthcare Ventures, New Enterprise Associates and Polaris Venture Partners.

Like many biotechs, Trevena plans to develop drugs that attack a particular biological mechanism rather than any particular disease. In this case, the company is targeting a class of proteins known as G-protein coupled receptors, or GPCR, which according to the company are affected by close to 40 percent of all drugs on the market today. The company didn’t describe its plans in any detail.

Healthcare investor EDF Ventures postpones fourth fund – EDF Ventures, an Ann Arbor, Mich., VC firm specializing in early-stage healthcare, has delayed a planned fourth fund, VentureWire reports. The postponement is related to the departure last year of managing director Beau Lasky, who left for Steamboat Ventures.

The firm intends to begin talking to potential investors again in several months. EDF didn’t say how much it hopes to raise in the new fund; its third fund closed in 2005 with $55 million in commitments.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• InfraReDx takes $17M for arterial-plaque detection (VentureWire)
• Cancer-drug developer Serenex sells out to Pfizer for undisclosed sum (release)
• Life-sciences fund Longitude Capital raises $95M (VentureWire)
• Hospital consultant Intercede Health names Gray Miller as CEO (release)

InfraReDx takes $17M for arterial-plaque detection – InfraReDx, a Burlington, Mass., developer of diagnostic systems that detect arterial plaque, raised $17 million in a third funding round, VentureWire reports. Sanderling Ventures led the round, joined by new and previous individual investors.

InfraReDx previously planned to raise up to $40 million in order to support expected commercialization of its near-infrared device, which can identify buildups of arterial plaque that can rupture and lead to heart attacks (see our coverage). The test, however, requires a minimally invasive procedure in which the device is threaded into a patient’s circulatory system, making the InfraReDx device primarily useful for preventing second heart attacks in patients who are being treated for their first.

The company submitted its device for FDA approval in October, and is planning on a limited rollout if the device is cleared this quarter, as InfraReDx expects.

Cancer-drug developer Serenex sells out to Pfizer for undisclosed sum – Durham, N.C.-based Serenex, a biotech working on drugs that could be useful in cancer and other conditions, agreed to be acquired by Pfizer. The release is here. The companies didn’t disclose terms of the deal.

Serenex claimed to have a technology for developing drugs against a wide variety of cellular proteins, but in practice Pfizer appears to have been most interested in drugs that inhibit heat-shock protein 90, or Hsp90, a molecule that regulates other proteins crucial to cellular growth and survival. The startup’s lead compound, SNX-5422, is in early-stage, phase I testing against a variety of tumors.

Pfizer, of course, will also walk away with Serenex’s drug-discovery technology and a library of other drug candidates. Notably, however, Pfizer did not buy the startup’s leading experimental drug, SNX-1012, which is being tested against oral mucositis, a common side effect of chemotherapy. That, of course, leaves open the possibility that Serenex management — or someone else — will try to form a new company around that drug. This sort of strategy is increasingly popular; for my take on it, see here.

Life-sciences fund Longitude Capital raises $95M – Menlo Park, Calif.-based Longitude Partners, a spinout of Pequot Ventures, raised $95 million of an anticipated $325 million first fund, VentureWire reports. The fund will invest in biotech, medical-device and drug-development startups.

(NOTE: This item originally appeared in today’s daily briefing. It’s been expanded and rewritten here.)

DNA-based diagnostics face a fundamental, though hardly insuperable, obstacle: When you’re looking for a rare mutation or other identifying sequence of DNA “letters” (technically known as bases or nucleotides), there are rarely enough matching DNA molecules in your average blood or tissue sample for today’s technology to detect. So many such tests first require technicians to “amplify” DNA in the sample, usually by a process called polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, which essentially “clones” DNA molecules by the millions — an extremely useful process that is nevertheless time-consuming and which requires expensive, specialized equipment.

One company claiming to have built a better DNA mousetrap is Adnavance Technologies, a Vancouver, Canada, startup with an intriguing nanotech method for detecting small quantities of DNA. Adnavance just raised C$3.7 million ($3.7 million) in a second round of funding, with investors including the Working Opportunity Fund, JovInvestment Management and the Business Development Bank of Canada.

As you can tell from its older logo, reproduced to the left, Adnavance chose its name in part to emphasize its focus on DNA. The company, founded in 2002, is developing tests based on a molecular trick that makes selected strands of DNA conduct electricity, making it possible to detect their presence using a microarray of tiny electrodes.

The basic idea is this: Using specific chemical conditions, Adnavance says it’s possible to force metallic ions between the double strands of DNA, where they displace the protons that usually help hold the helical molecules together. The metallic ions then serve much the same purpose as the central wire in a coaxial cable by freely conducting electricity, giving the DNA molecule as a whole an electrical property that can be measured directly.

Adnavance’s method starts by binding “capture” strands of DNA — that is, stretches that will bind to whatever mutated gene or viral sequence someone is looking for — to a gold electrode and “dehybridizing” them into their single-stranded forms. Once introduced to serum from a blood sample, say, those capture strands stick to matching DNA from the sample and resume their double-stranded shape. The system measures the conductivity of the bound DNA molecules, then introduces the metal ions to the solution, which in theory only integrate into capture probes that have bound perfectly to their targets — thus presumably eliminating mismatches. Measuring the difference in conductivity of the metallized strands compared to their predecessors yields a signal that the company says can detect as few as 500 matching DNA molecules. (By contrast, similar existing tests may require anywhere from 5,000 to 1 million target sequences to yield a detectable signal.)

The company’s first product candidate is a test for antibiotic-resistant staphylococcus, which it believes it can get onto the market by 2010. Adnavance believes its test will be simple enough for use in as many as 30,000 clinical laboratories that aren’t currently licensed to carry out existing DNA-based tests.

Oddly enough, Adnavance’s latest funding round is smaller than its first $3.9 million funding in 2005. That’s a little unusual for a company at this stage, and raises the natural question of whether it’s been forced to take a “down round” with a lower valuation than it previously held. An Adnavance representative, however, says that in 2005, the company actually included two other lines of business — focused on hydrogen fuel cells and DNA vaccines — that were spun out prior to the current funding round. So by that logic, the share of funding devoted to the DNA-diagnostic work has presumably risen. I should note, though, that the company’s lengthy release at the time was mostly devoted to its diagnostic work, and mentions the fuel-cell research in just two sentences at the end (and the vaccine not at all).

Adnavance has also named a new CEO, V. Randy White, who previously served as chief executive at Nanogen and Xenomics.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Adnavance pulls in C$3.7M for molecular diagnostics, names new CEO (release)
• “Personalized medicine” co. Proprius sells to Cypress Bio for up to $75M (release)
• Vaccinex raises $25M in wake of GSK deal for antibody drugs (VentureWire)
• Cianna Medical receives $9M for breast-cancer radiation treatment (release)
• Electron-microscope image provider NanoImaging takes in $1.5M (release)
• CrystalGenomics, ProQuest Investments create JV co. Palkion (release)
• Portico Systems, software maker for insurance plans, raises $7.7M (release)
• Stealthy biotech Affomic takes in $7M (peHUB)

Adnavance pulls in C$3.7M for molecular diagnostics, names new CEO – This item is now a standalone post here.

“Personalized medicine” co. Proprius sells to Cypress Bio for up to $75M – Proprius Pharmaceuticals, a San Diego diagnostics maker, sold itself to publicly traded Cypress Bioscience for up to $75 million in cash. The company’s release is here.

Cypress will pay $37.5 million up front, and another $37.5 million to Proprius shareholders as milestone payments. Proprius licenses and develops drugs and diagnostics for various forms or arthritis. Its most immediate product candidates include tests that aim to predict whether certain individuals will develop rheumatoid arthritis and that monitor patients’ response to methotrexate, a common treatment for RA.

Vaccinex raises $25M in wake of GSK deal for antibody drugs – Rochester, N.Y.-based Vaccinex, a developer of antibody drugs, raised $25 million in an add-on to its second funding round, VentureWire reports. Investors included Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, Pan Atlantic Bank and Trust and individual investors.

Earlier this month, Vaccinex and its partner EUSA Pharma licensed a Vaccinex antibody to GlaxoSmithKline for up to $44 million plus royalties. Vaccinex and EUSA will split any profits from GSK’s potential sales of the drug.

Cianna Medical receives $9M for breast-cancer radiation treatment – Cianna Medical, an Alisa Viejo, Calif., developer of devices for delivering local radiation in breast cancer, raised $9 million in a first funding round. Fog City Fund, Windamere Venture Partners and several private individuals provided the cash.

Cianna, which was spun out of BioLucent when it was acquired by Hologic last year, is working on new devices for brachytherapy, the general term for temporarily implanting radioactive material at the site of a tumor in order to provide localized radiation treatment. The Cianna device is designed to improve upon existing brachytherapy techniques in breast cancer.

Electron-microscope image provider NanoImaging takes in $1.5M – San Diego’s NanoImaging Services, a provider of imaging services involving transmission electron microscopy, raised $1.5 million in a funding round. Merck Capital Ventures led the round. The company specializes in the characterization of large biological molecules such as proteins, which are used in a variety of products such as vaccines and drugs.

CrystalGenomics, ProQuest Investments create new JV, Palkion – Today’s award for most baffling announcement comes courtesy of CrystalGenomics, an Emeryville, Calif.-based U.S. unit of the Korean drug-discovery company CG Pharmaceuticals, and ProQuest Investments, a New Jersey VC firm, who together have formed a joint venture they’re calling Palkion. Their release is here.

What is Palkion going to do? Beats me. Here’s what the release says:

Under this agreement, CrystalGenomics will receive up to $6 million in upfront and initial research funding from Palkion, in addition to development and sales milestone payments of potentially more than $200 million. CrystalGenomics will also initially own 50% of Palkion, Inc. ProQuest will capitalize Palkion with a Series A investment and also provide the management personnel for Palkion. CG will use its unique structure-based drug design capabilities to identify drug candidates while Palkion will oversee the clinical development of novel drug candidates.

So, let’s get this straight. CrystalGenomics and ProQuest form Palkion, in which they’ll hold equal stakes despite the fact that ProQuest seems to be putting all the capital and personnel into the venture. Palkion will then start handing the money to CrystalGenomics, which will continue trying to discover drugs while Palkion “oversees” the process of testing those drugs in people. All clear?

The best I can figure is that this is a roundabout way of putting a more “American” face on a basically Korean startup that — to judge from its Web site and, in fact, this press release — seems to have a certain amount of difficulty communicating clearly with a U.S. audience. That could certainly be a problem if its drugs make it into clinical trials, given how dialogue with the FDA becomes rather crucial at that stage. But that’s just my guess at this point.

Stealthy biotech Affomic takes in $7M – Affomic, a New Haven, Conn., biotech startup so stealthy that it can announce a funding without giving anyone a clue as to what it’s doing, raised $7 million in a first financing round, peHUB reports. Investors included Connecticut Innovations, Elm Street Ventures, and Four Seasons Ventures. It goes without saying that Affomic doesn’t have a Web site — in fact, the startup doesn’t even exist so far as Google is concerned.