Bioprocessing

Looking at Gov. William Donald Schaefer's $1.8 billion capital budget for next year, it is hard to believe that Maryland is in the midst of a substantial recession. The total set aside for construction is only slightly less than 1991, and that's because of severe problems in the Transportation Department and the need to reduce pay-as-you-go projects. Maryland continues to issue a hefty amount of bonds to put up new government buildings and support economic development initiatives.Over the past five years, construction spending, excluding transportation, has risen nearly 200 percent.

ANNAPOLIS -- Two broadly defined "clusters" of industries -- life sciences and information technologies -- will be the new focus of economic planning by the state, according to Maryland's chief economic development officer.Mark L. Wasserman, secretary of the economic and employment development, told a House committee yesterday that his department will coordinate all of its various employment and development activities to help those industry groupings that provide the greatest promise for growth in employment and the tax base.

ANNAPOLIS -- Projects ranging from the Christopher Columbus marine research center planned for the Inner Harbor to an incubator for biotechnology companies to a new prison in Western Maryland are included in Gov. William Donald Schaefer's ambitious $800 million building and maintenance program.Among the routine government projects such as improvements to sewage treatment plants or parkland acquisition in the governor's capital budget announced yesterday are some big-ticket items. Most of them are financed by the state's general obligation bonds or by revenue bonds, which means they won't affect this year's general spending budget.

ANNAPOLIS -- Projects ranging from the Christopher Columbus marine research center planned for the Inner Harbor to an incubator for biotechnology companies to a new prison in Western Maryland are included in Gov. William Donald Schaefer's ambitious $800 million building and maintenance program.Among the routine government projects such as improvements to sewage treatment plants or parkland acquisition in the governor's capital budget announced yesterday are some big-ticket items. Most of them are financed by the state's general obligation bonds or by revenue bonds, which means they won't affect this year's general spending budget.

Rich in cash and profitable, Life Technologies Inc. declared yesterday a special dividend of $3.50 a share and adopted a new dividend policy.The 8-year-old Gaithersburg company, a supplier to the growing biotechnology industry, has not paid dividends before, its president, J. Stark Thompson, said.The company's cash position was behind its decision to declare the one-time dividend, payable March 26 to shareholders of record March 12, he said."We're an unusual company in that over the years we have accumulated a lot of cash and no debt," Mr. Thompson said in a telephone interview from a meeting in New York.

Find some architects or engineers bent over a drawing board in Baltimore and there's a good chance they aren't crafting the next shopping mall.They have given up the hotel atrium and mall for the world of medicine and gene splicing. Today, their pencils are sharpened for hospital expansions, research towers and laboratories."That is where our future is," says Charles Myer of Henry Adams Inc., a mechanical engineering firm. About 40 percent of Henry Adams' work involves life-science projects -- and the firm wishes it were more.

ANNAPOLIS -- Maryland's biotechnology community made at least three big mistakes in the last century or so: Dramamine, Bufferin and Sweet 'n Lo.Actually, those weren't the mistakes. They were wildly successful products developed from inventions or discoveries made at the University of Maryland and the Johns Hopkins University, according to Thomas Chmura, deputy director of the Greater Baltimore Committee.The mistakes came when state, academic and private sector leaders let the technology go to manufacturers outside Maryland, forfeiting thousands of jobs and countless billions of dollars in revenues, Mr. Chmura said.

ANNAPOLIS -- Despite his budget troubles, Gov. William Donald Schaefer is planning an ambitious $800 million building and maintenance program.While much of the governor's capital budget is devoted to routine government projects such as improvements to sewage treatment plants or parkland acquisition, there are some big-ticket items.Most of these are financed by the state's general obligation bonds or by revenue bonds, and do not affect this year's general spending budget. Among them:* $17 million for the Christopher Columbus Center of Marine Research and Exploration planned for Baltimore's Inner Harbor.

Baltimore is celebrating the life sciences industry next month -- or at least its wish to become a major center for biotechnology and high-tech companies -- with a steady stream of seminars, groundbreakings and tours.The annual monthlong assembly, which began in 1990 as a coincidence of events rather than by design, will include sessions on creating international partnerships, transferring technology out of local universities, learning to apply entrepreneurship and attracting venture capital.

Compound may reduce need for root canalsResearchers at the University of Maryland at Baltimore are experimenting with a glass compound that may greatly reduce the need for that time-honored torture that is a staple of dentistry everywhere -- the root canal.The compound, known as Bioglass, is a ceramic material used for years in dentistry and shown to have healing properties. When gelatinized Bioglass is dropped into a hole in the gum left by a tooth extraction, for example, the compound enhances regeneration of both the bone and surrounding tissue.