Genome

Human Genome Sciences Inc. announced yesterday that it has determined the genomic code of a bacteria that is the third leading cause of infection in hospitals.The Rockville genomics company said it hopes to strike research collaborations with other companies to develop antibiotics or other treatments to fight the bacteria, Enterococcus faecalis.The organism is normally found in the intestines, but increasingly is causing urinary tract, surgical wound and abdominal infections during hospitalization.

The human brain is a marvelous instrument, capable of the subtlest thoughts, feelings and perceptions, and of dreams even the gods might envy. Yet for all our cleverness in other areas, we still know embarrassingly little about how our own brains actually work. That's why President Barack Obama's plan to launch a 10-year research initiative to map the intricate connections in the brain that give rise to everything we think, see and feel is a welcome first step toward enlarging our understanding of this amazing organ.

Technological advance always comes at a price. Mary Knudson's July 21 Sunday Sun story on gene mapping shows that the scientific value of charting the human genome carries a potentially debilitating price: loss of job mobility for people found "at risk" of genetic diseases; loss of insurability for families carrying certain gene combinations; even discrimination against people deemed likely to develop unfavorable psychological traits.It shouldn't be that way. Scientists pursuing the 15-year, multi-nation Human Genome Project expect to read the genetic code written in the 100,000 or so genes making up the 23 pairs of chromosomes in each human cell.

The White House proposed a sweeping new initiative Tuesday to map the individual cells and circuits that make up the human brain, a project that will give scientists a better understanding of how a healthy brain works and how to devise better treatments for injuries and diseases. "There is this enormous mystery waiting to be unlocked," said President Barack Obama of the project unveiled at a White House ceremony packed with scientists. Called the Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies Initiative, the program would be funded with an initial $100 million from the president's fiscal 2014 budget, which the White House is to release next week.

Spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to map your genome may be the latest fad to glean the future. But for all the billions spent on research, genetic testing isn't a cure-all for what might ail you, and it could lead to significant trouble for individuals and society if misused. Researchers and businesses are eager to profit by selling genetic tests to assess everything from paternity or sexual computability to an individual's susceptibility to disease. For some, such tests can be a blessing.

Human Genome Sciences Inc., a Rockville-based company associated with The Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR), plans to go public with the sale of 2.25 million common shares worth about $31 million.Gaithersburg-based TIGR, a not-for-profit company involved in gene sequencing and analysis, was formed by Dr. J. Craig Venter, a scientist formerly at the National Institutes of Health.In exchange for providing TIGR with about $85 million in funding over 10 years, Human Genome acquired rights to inventions and patents arising from TIGR's research.

Human Genome Sciences Inc., a Rockville biotechnology firm, said yesterday that it has received clearance to begin human testing of a drug to treat an arterial disease that afflicts thousands of Americans every year.Human Genome said the Food and Drug Administration has granted permission to begin clinical studies of its Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor-2, known as VEGF-2.The drug will be tested in patients suffering from critical limb ischemia, a disease that causes severe pain, skin lesions and reduced blood flow in the arms and legs.

NEW YORK -- Human Genome Sciences Inc.'s initial offering of 2.25 million common shares was priced at $12 a share yesterday by underwriters led by Lehman Bros.The Rockville-based company had expected the shares to be offered between $10 and $12.The company, a gene-sequencing specialist that seeks to use newly discovered information about the human genome to produce commercial health care products, is one of the first ventures created in the wake of the human genome project. The project is an international campaign begun in 1990 to identify the estimated 100,000 genes contained in the chromosomes of every human cell.

Human Genome Sciences Inc., the Rockville-based genomics company, said yesterday that it has filed a proposal with the Securities and Exchange Commission to sell 3 million shares of common stock, increasing the number of shares outstanding by 15 percent to 21 million.Assuming a share price of $43, the company estimated that it would raise about $121 million -- the most it has ever raised from investors -- in the offering.News of the announcement drove Human Genome's share price down yesterday.

Human Genome Sciences Inc. reported yesterday net income of $1.2 million, or 5 cents per share, for its second quarter.Earnings in the period, which ended June 30, were sharply lower than the $2.9 million, or 13 cents per share, in the second quarter of 1997.The Rockville-based genomics company, which is developing two experimental drugs, said second-quarter revenue fell to $13.9 million from $14.8 million in revenue in the 1997 quarter.In the first six months of the year, Human Genome said, it had a net loss of $8.5 million, or 38 cents a share, compared with a net loss of $9.2 million, or 44 cents a share the year before.

Human Genome Sciences Inc., which was acquired for $3.6 billion by London-based GlaxoSmithKline Plc in August, intends to lay off 97 employees in mid-December, and an additional but unspecified number of cuts are planned for next year, the company warned Maryland labor regulators this week. The Rockville-based biopharmaceuticals company, which employed as many as 1,000 people up until the acquisition, is in the process of integrating with GSK, a spokesman said. Previously, the company disclosed in September it would cut 114 positions by the end of this month.

Rockville-based Human Genome Sciences has warned state regulators that it plans to cut 114 jobs beginning in October, three months after striking a deal to be acquired by GlaxoSmithKline. Human Genome, which employs about 1,000 people in Rockville, could not be reached for comment Wednesday. But it told the state Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation that the layoffs — to start Oct. 30 — were part of an internal restructuring. GlaxoSmithKline, a London pharmaceutical firm, also could not immediately be reached for comment.

Like a one-two punch, two major Maryland employers in the health care service and pharmaceutical industries were the targets last week of multibillion-dollar acquisition deals. Both homegrown companies — Human Genome Sciences Inc. and Catalyst Health Solutions Inc. — are based in Rockville. Both were courted by out-of-state companies. Human Genome ultimately rebuffed a $2.6 billion offer by biopharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, saying it was too low. But Catalyst agreed to be acquired by a larger Illinois competitor for $4.4 billion, and Human Genome has officially acknowledged it's on the market.

Shares of Human Genome Sciences doubled in Thursday morning trading on news that a major British biopharmaceutical company offered to buy it for $2.6 billion, which the Rockville company rejected as too low. Human Genome, which uses the human DNA sequence to develop targeted drugs, said in a news statement that GlaxoSmithKline PLC offered to buy the company for $13 a share in cash. The company declined the offer, saying it did not "reflect the value inherent" in Human Genome, and added that it had begun exploring strategic alternatives, including a possible sale.

For those who missed it in today's Sun, there was a story about veterans being asked to serve again by giving some blood for a databank. The DNA information will be used to help scientists learn about the causes of disease and develop preventive methods and treatments. Many vets have already stepped up, but the Department of Veterans Affairs is looking for a million former service members to participate. The information will be kep confidential and vets will be able to approve use of data for each study under taken.

Within days of the E.coli outbreak in Germany that officially ended this week, scientists at the University of Maryland Institute for Genome Sciences began cracking the genomic code of the bacteria responsible for infecting thousands and killing dozens. Information about all the genes that make up the bacteria from these scientists and others around the globe was soon offered online at no cost to doctors treating those infected, possibly saving lives, as well as to epidemiologists looking for the source of the pathogen.

Human Genome Sciences Inc. plans to open a $42 million manufacturing and processing plant today in Rockville, where it expects to produce pioneering new drugs based on its storehouse of information about genes and the roles they have in healing and disease.The plant, built with the help of $2 million in state financing, is on a 13-acre site in a new life sciences park that the Johns Hopkins University is developing, the Johns Hopkins Belward Research Campus. It is a few miles from Human Genome's Rockville headquarters.

Human Genome Sciences Inc., the Rockville biotechnology company mapping genetic codes, yesterday reported a net loss of $12 million, or 62 cents per share, for the first quarter of 1997.By comparison, the company posted a profit of $4.28 million, or 22 cents per share, for the same period last year.Company executives attributed the difference to a sharp variance in the company's receipt of payments from research and development partners.During the first quarter ending March 31, Human Genome said it received $1.3 million in collaboration revenue.

BETHESDA - - President Barack Obama toured a Maryland cancer lab Wednesday to promote the awarding of $5 billion in new government health science grants, which he described as the "largest single boost to biomedical research in history." The National Institutes of Health grants, distributed in recent weeks to more than 12,000 projects around the country, are funded under the $787 billion federal stimulus program that Obama signed into law in February. In all, about $100 billion in stimulus money is to go to science and technology projects, according to the administration.

For the first time, researchers have decoded all the genes of a person with cancer and found a set of mutations that may have caused the disease or aided its progression. Using cells donated by a woman in her 50s who died of leukemia, the scientists sequenced all the DNA from her cancer cells and compared it with the DNA from her normal, healthy skin cells. Then, they zeroed in on 10 mutations that occurred only in the cancer cells, apparently spurring abnormal growth, preventing the cells from suppressing that growth and enabling them to fight off chemotherapy.