Feb 15, 2008 - Preventing A Superbug
Methicillin-resistant staphylococcus (MRSA) is a common cause of skin infections. It can also cause pneumonia, ear infections and sinusitis. MRSA bacteria are sometimes dubbed "superbugs" because they are highly resistant to common antibiotics like penicillin, making infections difficult to treat effectively . . .



Feb 01, 2008 - Hospitals Turn To It For Defense
When you gotta have it, you gotta have it. And hospitals gotta have weapons against infections within their walls -- especially methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA . . .



Jan 02, 2008 - Cepheid: Is the MRSA Infection an Investment Opportunity?
I have written about the killer, super-bug staph infection MRSA, but new, proposed legislation in California is bound to make it a headline again -- and a big one!



Jan 01, 2008 - I Want It Now! New developments continue to improve stat-testing turnaround
New developments continue to improve stat-testing turnaround. Stat testing will never fall by the wayside, but its handling has undergone significant change . . .



Jan 01, 2008 - For molecular, a brand-new way
. . . There are a good 10 or 12 companies I know about that, in various phases of development, are working to develop POC molecular diagnostics. They’re not ready for prime time—with the single exception of Cepheid and its platform called GeneXpert . . .



Dec 01, 2007 - Obstacles to Exploitation of miRNA Falling
t’s 2007, and at this point miRNA needs no introduction. Just in case you’re late to the party, though, miRNAs are small, single-stranded nucleotides, which were originally believed to have little impact on gene expression and protein formation . . .



Nov 16, 2007 - Superbug bumps up Cepheid
n the six months since Cepheid Inc. won FDA approval for its GeneXpert test, stock almost quadrupuled from a low of $7.40 to a high of $27.60, and third quarter revenue jumped to $36.3 million -- 53 percent above the same period the previous year . . .



Nov 01, 2007 - Weathering The Biomarker Blizzard
In the late 1800s, Samuel Siegfried Karl Ritter von Basch invented the sphygmomanometer the analog device most medical professionals still use to measure blood pressure. Thus came the detection and quantitation of a significant, early biomarker. Over the last two centuries, many more biomarkers emerged, including today's sophisticated molecular biomarkers, a key ingredient of modern biotech and pharma. "Right now, biomarkers lie very close to the top of the value chain," says David Persing, chief medical and technology officer at Cepheid in Sunnyvale, California.



Oct 28, 2007 - Cepheid Inc. of Sunnyvale to help defeat dangerous 'superbug'
Cepheid Inc. first made its name with anthrax-detection tests to guard the nation's post offices from bioterrorism attacks back in 2001. Now, the Sunnyvale company's gene-based testing system is becoming part of an escalating nationwide defense against the deadly "superbug" called MRSA, which is often innocently spread by well-meaning health care workers . . .



Oct 28, 2007 - Cepheid Inc. of Sunnyvale to help defeat dangerous 'superbug'
Cepheid Inc. first made its name with anthrax-detection tests to guard the nation's post offices from bioterrorism attacks back in 2001.