Massachusetts Institute of Technology news from FierceBioResearcher

Researchers from the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at Massachusetts Institute of Technology have reversed mild retardation and severe autism in mice by inhibiting the enzyme called p21-activated kinase (PAK). Their study focused on Fragile X Syndrome (FXS)--a leading cause of retardation and autism--which is linked to a mutated X chromosome gene. The PAK enzyme controls the connections between neurons and the brain.

"Strikingly, PAK inhibition also restored electrical …

A worldwide analysis of biotech patents shows that universities and public research institutions play the leading role in drug discovery, with the U.S. and Japan well ahead of Europe in innovation. The intellectual property firm Marks & Clerk examined patents filed between 2002 and 2006 and found that the Japan Science and Technology Agency played the lead role in filing 1,022 patent "families;" clusters of patents all linked to a single discovery. The University of California ranked …

The National Human Genome Research Institute has granted tens of millions of dollars to three major sequencing centers: The Broad Institute Sequencing Platform of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University; The Washington University Genome Sequencing Center, Washington University School of Medicine; and the Human Genome Sequencing Center, Baylor College of Medicine. They'll be assisting the Cancer Genome Atlas Pilot Project, which is attempting to systematically …

A new report from the Milken Institute says that Harvard is the number one university in the world for producing top-quality biotech research and that eight of the top 10 research universities are in the United States. The University of Tokyo and the University of London both made the top 10, though, coming in at the second and third slots. When looked at strictly by the number of biotech patents produced, The University of Texas system is first, followed by U.C. San Francisco, Johns …