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Humans, and the microbes that live inside us, could be the source of the next generation of antibiotics...German researchers just discovered an antibiotic (lugdunin) produced by bacteria (S. lugdunensis) that inhabit our noses. This new antibiotic can kill MRSA (methicillin resistant S. aureus), the poster child for drug resistance and the culprit behind the most pernicious hospital-acquired staph infections..."Our study can help to understand what we can do to eradicate these pathogens from the microbiota of healthy people," said Andreas Peschel, lead author of the study, published...in Nature...

J&J has thrown open its R&D doors — to all comers. Will this uber-open-access strategy work? ...Just five years ago, one of the last places one would have looked for innovation at Johnson & Johnson was in its Merryfield Road lab in La Jolla, Calif...The R&D facility for the healthcare giant, No. 103 on Fortune’s Global 500 list, had become something of a scientific wasteland...These days, the gleaming, state-of-the-art space is teeming with entrepreneurial spirit and cutting-edge science. What’s odd, though, is that these researchers toiling away within J&J’s walls—and making use of J&J’s abundant resources—do not work for the company. Nor do the findings or the discoveries they produce there belong to J&J. Some of these drug scientists even receive funding from J&J’s competitors. As for the venerable, 130-year-old company that’s paying for all this largesse, it claims it wants nothing more out of the arrangement than for its tenants—all life science start-ups—to succeed.

The latest Marvel-created superhero, Samarium, has the power to suit up instantly in magnetic and impenetrable full-body armor. But like most superheroes, he also has a secret. And in this Takeda Pharmaceuticals-sponsored comic, it’s inflammatory bowel disease...Takeda worked with the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation of America and Marvel Custom Solutions to create its first-ever pharma company-sponsored superhero to shine a light on the many sufferers of IBD who hide their disease. The disease awareness campaign includes the graphic illustration series with IBD-suffering hero Samarium, as well as digital paid ads and social media shares...

Pfizer will build a biologics plant in China, where it will make biosimilars for the Chinese market but also for sale throughout the world. The New York drugmaker has turned to GE for construction of the facility, which has developed a modular construction process that will cut the cost and allow the plant to be operational in about 18 months, instead of three years...The $350 million facility, which it is building at the Hangzhou Economic Development Area in China, will be Pfizer’s third biologics production facility and its first in Asia. In addition to manufacturing, the facility will house Pfizer China’s Biosimilars and Biologics Quality, Technical Service, Logistics and Engineering divisions, and serve as a site for process development and clinical supplies. It will have about 150 employees when it is complete in 2018…The new center will be built using GE’s single-use technology…likened assembly to working with LEGO blocks...

U.S. and British officials announced an ambitious collaboration...designed to accelerate the discovery and development of new antibiotics in the fight against one of the modern era’s greatest health threats: antibiotic resistance...CARB-X, for Combating Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria Biopharmaceutical Accelerator, will create one of the world’s largest public-private partnerships focused on preclinical discovery and development of new antimicrobial products...The undertaking includes two agencies within the U.S. Health and Human Services Department that focus on biomedical research and Britain’s Wellcome Trust, a London-based global biomedical research charity. It also includes academic, industry and other nongovernmental organizations...The partnership is committed to providing $44 million in funding in the first year and up to $350 million in new funds over five years to increase the number of antibiotics in the drug-development pipeline. The ultimate goal...is to move promising antibiotic candidates through the critical early stages so they can attract enough private or public investment for advanced development and win approval by U.S. and British regulatory agencies...

Dog as man’s best friend...Now a small startup in Philadelphia is making the saying applicable to the pharmaceutical and drug development world...Drugs that are developed by pharmaceutical companies are...tested first in animals to evaluate their safety and how they interact with living tissue. But the typical testing method is to take a healthy animal, give them a certain disease, test the drug, therapy, or medical device, and then kill them...The One Health Company is trying something new by finding dogs (and cats) with naturally occurring diseases that are also present in humans, like bone cancer, and testing new drugs or therapies on them. The goal is two-fold: Provide pro-bono care for pet owners to heal their own pets, while facilitating bringing new drugs to market by collecting data for pharmaceutical companies...The...approach...is notably different. Pets remain with their families, diseases are never induced, and putting a pet down is never considered an option in any of their clinical trials. Families caring for their sick pets as they undergo these trials collect data, via smartphone, on their pets’ behavior and habits using proprietary clinical trial management software...

Josh Stein, CEO and co-founder of AdhereTech, discusses how technology can enhance the ability of specialty pharmacies to manage their patients' therapy regimen.

Several teams of scientists are racing to develop a vaccine for the Zika virus. But what if a drug that already exists could stop an infection in its tracks?...According to new research, it’s not a totally crazy idea...A group of researchers has identified two dozen Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs that have shown some ability to block Zika from infecting human cells in the lab, according to a paper published...in the journal Cell Host & Microbe. Some of these drugs — which treat infections, cancers, and even depression— also showed potential to prevent infection in certain cells tied to fetal defects in pregnant women...the next steps in testing the drugs against Zika, and added that scientists should consider using some of the drugs together because they work in different ways...The candidate drugs don’t all share certain characteristics...While some have shown past hints that they can fight flaviviruses — the virus family that includes Zika — others had never before shown any antiviral ability, according to the study...

The first fully autonomous drone delivery to a customer home has occurred, and the retailer behind it is not who you would expect...Leading convenience chain 7-Eleven partnered with independent drone delivery service Flirtey and the Nevada Institute for Autonomous Systems to complete two deliveries from a store in Reno, Nevada on Sunday, July 10. 7-Eleven merchandise, including hot and cold food items, were loaded into a Flirtey drone delivery container and flown autonomously using precision GPS to a local customer’s house... "Drone delivery is the ultimate convenience for our customers and these efforts create enormous opportunities to redefine convenience," said Jesus H. Delgado-Jenkins, executive VP and chief merchandising officer of 7-Eleven. "This delivery marks the first time a retailer has worked with a drone delivery company to transport immediate consumables from store to home...

I’ll respectfully disagree: Healthcare "Ubers" are already proliferating and will ultimately reshape 21st-century medicine. The more aspects of healthcare we can shift from relationship to transaction, the better life will be for patients and doctors alike..."Uber for X, Y or Z" means "making something easy and convenient." But Uber is also about safety, reliability, and civility...Uber’s true essence is this: It accumulates a vast amount of information on the micro-details of cities; overlays that information with real-time data on prospective drivers, riders, and road conditions; reduces staggeringly complex decision trees to algorithms; and instantly presents drivers with a manageable number of highly intuitive options. It thus obliterates the learning curves and fixed costs that such information previously demanded...Uber establishes, digitizes, and stores relationships to make transactions possible...To shift some (not all) of healthcare from relationship to transaction, we’ll have to imitate what Uber did: Accumulate vast databases of population health care information. Develop better and more comprehensive telemetry for real-time tracking. Apply artificial intelligence to discern patterns no intuitive physician can see and to narrow down treatment options. And package this information for instant comprehension by patients and providers...some aspects of healthcare will be impervious to Uber-like innovation...As we convert more and more of medicine to transactions—and we will—patients will find it easier to tend to their health, and doctors will find themselves freer to focus on those areas where relationships are truly irreplaceable...