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The U.S. Navy and Missile Defense Agency, supported by Lockheed Martin, successfully completed a series of tests of the Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) 4.0.3 Aegis Combat System in the Atlantic Ocean.
The agency completed the tests as part of Formidable Shield 2017 (FS-17), a North Atlantic... Read More »
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) launched Tuesday the Hidden Signals Challenge, a competition that seeks ideas for novel uses of existing data to discover emerging biothreats.
The competition offers a $300,000 prize.
“This Challenge is... Read More »
Raytheon’s Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) defense system recently intercepted a medium-range ballistic missile target at sea during a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)-led multinational operational demonstration off the coast of Scotland.
The demonstration, called Formidable Shield 17, was... Read More »
The Blue Ribbon Study Panel on Biodefense, a privately funded group established in 2014 to ascertain the current biodefense capabilities of the United States and issue expert recommendations to encourage change, has grown increasingly worried about microbial forensics and biological... Read More »
Looking to a drug already on the market for treating thrombocytopenia, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has joined a private corporation in evaluating its use against radiation injuries.
The drug in question is approved for use to treat low blood platelet counts resulting... Read More »
The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) recently entered into a nine-month, $12 million contract with Achaogen, Inc to develop an antibiotic called C-scape that could treat certain types of drug-resistant bacteria and infections caused by bacteria used in biowarfare.... Read More »
Sanofi’s ACAM2000 and associated contracts are now in the possession of Emergent BioSolutions Inc, following payment of a $117.5 million acquisition.
In all, Emergent has gained control of the only smallpox vaccine approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, a cGMP live viral... Read More »
A joint project between private, academic and military interests has the potential to make screening and treating populations for infectious diseases easier and safer.
The $11.7 million multi-year project, to create a new universal surveillance platform for infectious disease outbreaks, will be... Read More »
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced plans this week to join Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in a partnership focused on the development of infectious disease treating products.
Specifically, it will be the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA)... Read More »
The Global Task Force on Cholera Control (GTFCC), an initiative of more than 50 United Nations’ agencies, academic institutions, and nongovernmental organizations, recently announced the launch of a new strategy that aims to reduce deaths from cholera by 90 percent by 2030.
The effort, called... Read More »
Emergent BioSolutions Inc. said on Wednesday it was awarded a contract valued at up to $25 million from the U.S. State Department to supply Trobigard, an intramuscular auto-injector treatment to be used in the event of chemical threats such as nerve agents, in countries outside of the United... Read More »
The Security Industry Association (SIA) announced Tuesday its endorsement of H.R. 3548, the Border Security for America Act of 2017 (BSAA), which would strengthen tactical infrastructure on the U.S. northern and southern borders.
SIA sent a letter to the House Homeland Security Committee last... Read More »
A collaborative effort aimed at bringing together a variety of health and security experts to chart the future of U.S. leadership in global health security was recently launched by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
Officially slated to begin work in February 2018, the... Read More »
Emergent BioSolutions Inc. said on Tuesday it completed the acquisition of raxibacumab, an antibody for treatment and prophylaxis of inhalational anthrax, from GSK.
Emergent said raxibacumab is the only fully human monoclonal antibody approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for... Read More »
Hamid Ali Rao, Deputy Director-General for the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), recently participated in a ceremony marking the completion of the full destruction of 39,967 metric tons of chemical weapons previously possessed by the Russian Federation.
Largely... Read More »
A plan to protect subways in the event of a chemical or biological attack is ready to be put into place and implemented, scientists say.
Mark Tucker, engineer at Sandia National Laboratories, is leading a project to study how to decontaminate chemical and biological weapons attacks, such as... Read More »
Available now to the buying public is Reactive Skin Decontamination Lotion (RSDL) from Emergent BioSolutions, a lotion that protects human skin against chemical warfare agents (CWAs).
Specifically, RSDL, which was previously only available to the military, is a patented, broad-spectrum liquid... Read More »
The Alabama Department of Public Health recently announced the launch of a serious infectious disease response network in order to help identify and respond to potential outbreaks as they occur.
According to Mary McIntyre, chief medical officer for the Alabama Department of Public Health, the... Read More »
The Nebraska Public Health Laboratory (NPHL) recently underwent an inspection of its patient care, quality control, and other critical facets and was subsequently reaccredited by the College of American Pathologists.
The reaccreditation places the lab among 7,700 other accredited facilities... Read More »
A meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) assembled experts in human and animal health last week to address early warning systems for animal-to-human (zoonotic) disease outbreaks.
“Early detection is the key,” Trevor Shoemaker, a CDC epidemiologist formerly based in Uganda,... Read More »
An algorithm that automatically determines how much useful information is contained in latent crime scene fingerprints was recently developed by scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and Michigan State University.
During the crime scene discovery process, the... Read More »
The number of suspected cholera cases in Yemen has surpassed more than 500,000 during 2017, with approximately 2,000 patients succumbing to the virus’ lethal effects since the outbreak began, according to a recent release from the World Health Organization (WHO).
"Yemen’s health workers are... Read More »
The Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) has two new tools at their disposal for predicting cattle shipments and preparing for disease outbreaks among them.
With department funding, the two new web-based tools include the U.S. Animal Movement Model... Read More »
The research community involved with academic biomedicine should improve its abilities to mitigate and recover from disasters, according to a recent report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine.
According to the report, the results of various disasters, ranging from... Read More »
The James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS) recently published a database on the website of the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) that details all of Iran’s missile and space launch vehicle (SLV) tests since 1988, which marked the end of the Iran-Iraq war.
Specifically, the... Read More »
The International Police Organization (INTERPOL) and Palo Alto Networks recently signed an agreement at the INTERPOL Global Complex for Innovation (IGCI) in Singapore that will increase collaboration between the two organizations on cybercrime issues.
The agreement provides a framework for... Read More »
An outbreak of dengue fever first identified in May continues to affect multiple regions in the Ivory Coast, according to a recent report by the World Health Organization (WHO).
The first cases of the outbreak were reported to public health authorities on April 22 and were confirmed by an... Read More »
The International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) named Chief Tom Jenkins, from the fire department of Rogers, Arkansas as their new president and chairman last week.
In his new role, Jenkins will serve as the organization’s spokesman and dignitary. He will also be responsible to testify for... Read More »
Emergent Biosolutions said on Monday it has been awarded a contract worth approximately $23 million from the Medical Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) Defense Consortium (MCDC) for the development of an innovative multi-drug auto injector for nerve agent antidote... Read More »
Emergent Biosolutions said on Wednesday it has entered into a licensing agreement with Valneva SE for the global exclusive rights to the company’s Zika vaccine technology, ZIKV.
“Emergent is focused on providing preparedness solutions to public health threats and emerging infectious... Read More »
Emergent BioSolutions said on Wednesday it plans to acquire GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK) raxibacumab, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved monoclonal antibody used for the treatment of inhalation anthrax, in an all-cash transaction valued at up to $96 million.
Raxibacumab is approved... Read More »
Emergent BioSolutions Inc. said on Friday it plans to acquire Sanofi’s ACAM2000 business, the only vaccine licensed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for active immunization against smallpox, in an all-cash transaction totaling up to $125 million.
ACAM2000 is the primary smallpox... Read More »
Botulinum toxin, produced by Clostridium botulinum bacteria, is the most potent biological toxin known to exist on Earth. The toxin causes botulism, a severe muscle-paralyzing, potentially fatal disease, characteristics that increase its likelihood as a potential bioweapon.
And while the U.S.... Read More »
Raytheon Company’s advanced Standard Missile-6 (SM-6) Block IA, an offensive and defensive missile system, aced its final land-based test this week after engaging and destroying a subsonic target from a test site in southern New Mexico.
With this success, the SM-6 Block IA will now move to... Read More »
In the wake of a recent report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which found that Zika infection during any trimester of a pregnancy can lead to severe birth defects, the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) called on public health leaders to... Read More »
