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EXPANDING GlaxoSmithKUne's corporate headquarters in Brentford, Middlesex, England.

P H A R M A C E U T I C A L S

GLAXO ACQUIRES VACCINES PLAYER Deal for biotech firm Corixa locks up supply of key ingredient

SIGNALING BIG PHARMAINTER-est in the vaccine field, Glaxo-SmithKline has agreed to

pay about $300 million to acquire Corixa, a Seattle-based company that develops vaccine adjuvants.

Vaccines are a tra­ditionally slow-grow­ing business that came into the spot­light last year when a British plant operat­ed by Chiron was deemed unfit to man­ufacture the flu vac­cine. The resulting shortage underscored the tenuousness of global vaccine supply

Although GSK is

involved in traditional pediatric vaccines for diseases such as measles, mumps, and tetanus, it is also developing vaccines for new, less well-known indications.

Notably, the company is in late-stage testing of Cervarix, a potentially multi-billion-dollar vaccine that targets infection by the human papilloma virus, a leading cause of cervical cancer.

Last month, Merck & Co. published favorable clinical trial results for its own HPV vaccine, Gardasil. John Savopoulos, head of the infectious disease unit at business information firm Data-monitor, says these products are part of a "new wave" of innova­tion for the global vaccine indus­

try, which had sales last year of about $8.1 billion.

Savopoulos calls vaccines a "hidden jewel" for drug compa­nies like GSK, Merck, and San-ofi-Aventis. "The business is sol­id, and entry barriers to would-be competitors are high," he says. Datamonitor expects double-digit growth rates in coming years as governments and inter­national groups step up vacci­nation coverage.

Cervarix, which is on track to be launched next year, owes its ef­fectiveness in part to MPL, or monophosphoryl lipid A, an ad­juvant supplied by Corixa. When combined with vaccines, MPL stimulates the body's immune system to produce greater vac­cine protection.

MPL is also used in tubercu­losis, malaria, herpes, breast can­cer, and prostate cancer vaccines being developed by GSK. By ac­quiring Corixa, GSK will elimi­nate payment of royalties on the adjuvant and will gain control of the Hamilton, Mont., plant that produces it. —MICHAEL MCCOY

G O V E R N M E N T & P O L I C Y

ACADEMY ELECTS NEW MEMBERS NAS elects 72 new members and 18 foreign associates from 14 countries

THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF Sciences announced the election of 72 new members

and 18 foreign members during its 142nd annual meeting in Wash-

Valentine Solomon Schatz Bertozzi

ington, D.C., last week. Of those elected, 19 members and two as­sociates are women—an all-time high number. The new members bring the total U.S. membership in

NAS to 1,976 and its foreign membership to 360.

Of the new members, the following people are chemists or work in areas related to chemistry and the chemical sciences: Carolyn R. Bertozzi University of California, Berkeley

Axel T. Brunger Stanford University Malcolm H. Chisholm Ohio State University, Columbus David T. Gibson University of Iowa Susan Band Horwitz Albert Einstein College of Med­icine of Yeshiva University Wayne L. Hubbell School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles Aziz Sancar University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill George C. Schatz Northwestern University Edward I. Solomon Stanford University Joan S. Valentine University of California, Los Angeles Ellen D.Williams University of Maryland, College Park -SUSAN MORRISSEY

8 C&EN / MAY 9. 2005 W W W . C E N - 0 N L I N E . O R G