QB3's 'Startup in a Box' powers new wave of biotech startups

Caribou Biosciences CEO Rachel Haurwitz.

QB3’s boxes are stacking up. Startup in a Box, which initially aimed at helping 15 wannabe life sciences entrepreneurs blow past barriers to launching companies, has aided 76 startups since it began a year ago — and it is pushing deeper into the Bay Area. The 17 companies fully operational with Startup in a Box’s aid have set up shop in San Francisco, Berkeley, Walnut Creek and San Jose. That diaspora is exactly what leaders of the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences, or QB3, had in mind when they started the program in summer 2011 to help entrepreneurs-in-waiting incorporate a company, get startup government funding, protect their intellectual property or simply set up a no-fee company bank account. What they weren’t counting on, however, was an overflowing box.

Berkeley Lab makes electricity from viruses

Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory figured out a way to generate power using viruses. The viruses, which aren't harmful, convert mechanical energy into electricity. They use the principle of piezoelectricity, where a charge is stored in something solid when it is put under mechanical stress.

From Hart to heart: Grateful Dead drummer, Gladstone Institutes work to find the sounds of cardiac cells

Mickey Hart is taking the Gladstone Institutes on a long, strange trip.
The Grammy-winning drummer with iconic hippie rock group the Grateful Dead is teaming with Deepak Srivastava, the head of San Francisco’s Gladstone Institute for Cardiovascular Research, in an effort to discover the sounds that cells make.
For Srivastava and other Gladstone scientists, the collaboration could help them discover if there’s a difference between the sounds of healthy cells and unhealthy ones. Converting the heart’s electrical activity into sound, Srivastava said, could give researchers and clinicians another tool for developing drugs that return them to a healthy rhythm or detour illness.

Lawrence Berkeley Lab's JBEI spins out first biofuels company: Lygos

The Joint BioEnergy Institute of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has spun out its first business, a cellulosic biofuel company named Lygos.
Emeryville’s JBEI is led by Jay Keasling, who is one of the five men who started Lygos. The JBEI itself was started in 2007 and will likely be moved from Emeryville into the lab’s new campus, now planned for the Richmond Field Station along San Francisco Bay.
Lygos has so far used sugar as a feedstock to create fuel -- or “petrochemical replacements” -- on a laboratory scale. The process it uses to make the chemicals is itself “nearly carbon neutral,” the lab said.

A closer look at Lawrence Berkeley Lab's new second campus

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab expects the first phase of its proposed second campus in Richmond to be up and running by 2016.
The lab announced Monday that it had selected the Richmond Field Station to house the second campus, which could include up to 2 million square feet of office, lab and research and development space.

Lawrence Berkeley Lab boss Alivisatos wins chemistry prize

Paul Alivisatos, director of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, won the Wolf Foundation Prize in Chemistry for 2012.
Alivisatos, who took over from Steven Chu after the former director went off to become U.S. Secretary of Energy, is an expert on nanochemistry. He shares this year’s prize, which includes $100,000, with Charles Lieber, a nanoscience expert at Harvard University.
Alivisatos won for development of colloidal inorganic nanocrystal, considered a building block of nanoscience.

Lawrence Berkeley Lab hires UCLA expert for Molecular Foundry

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory lured a UCLA chemist to run the lab’s Molecular Foundry nanoscience research center.
Omar Yaghi started work Jan. 3 at the laboratory on the hill above the University of California, Berkeley, campus. He also joined U.C. Berkeley’s chemistry department.

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab delays selection of 2nd campus to 2012

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has pushed back the date when it expects to announce its selection for a proposed second campus to early 2012.
The lab, controlled by the University of California, had previously said the announcement would come by the end of November of this year.

Finalists for 2nd Lawrence Berkeley Lab campus push for deal

Six development teams continue pushing to be selected for Lawrence Berkeley National Lab’s proposed 2 million-square-foot second campus — a project that has the potential to transform the site and city where it lands.
Not only would the lab’s facilities and jobs be a huge boost to any community, the potential for spinoff companies and additional real estate development has cities and developers eager for a decision.

Joint BioEnergy Institute scientists ID new type of biofuel

Researchers at the Joint BioEnergy Institute in Emeryville identified a possible new type of biofuel that could replace diesel.
The JBEI, run by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, engineered the new fuel, called bisabolane, from two microbes -- a bacteria and a yeast.
Fuel made this way, the lab said, would be “clean, green, renewable and produced in the United States.”

UC awards 13 grants to projects to bridge 'valley of death'

The University of California has awarded 13 “proof of concept” grants to researchers to help bridge the so-called “valley of death” and develop new technologies or treatments.
Among the winners of grants ranging from $100,000 to $250,000 were three Bay Area projects. Gao Liu of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is working on a conductive polymer binder and silicon composite electrode, the University of California, Berkeley’s James Evans is developing completely printable batteries for energy storage and UC Berkeley’s Dmitry Budker is working on a next generation of ultra-precise magnetic sensors.

Lawrence Berkeley Lab opens biofuels test center in Emeryville

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory opened a 15,000 square foot biofuels research center in Emeryville this week.
The Advanced Biofuels Process Demonstration Unit, or ABPDU, will allow large scale tests of processes developed in laboratory work. The biofuels in the center are made from “cellulosic biomass” -- i.e. bits of plants that aren’t useful for food or animal feed -- and the lab hopes their development will create a new energy industry in the United States.

Lawrence Berkeley Lab picks 6 finalists for second campus

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has identified six finalists in cities including Alameda, Berkeley, Oakland, Emeryville, Albany and Richmond for its potential second campus site.

UC Berkeley, Lawrence Berkeley Lab start Synthetic Biology Institute, with Agilent as 1st corporate partner

A new institute formed by the University of California, Berkeley, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory will work to engineer cells and biological systems to tap discoveries in health, energy and new materials, among other targets.
Agilent Technologies Inc. is the first corporate partner of the Synthetic Biology Institute. UC Berkeley did not say how much Santa Clara-based Agilent (NYSE: A) will pay, but it said the company made a multiyear, multimillion-dollar commitment.

Shortlist for Lawrence Berkeley National Lab second campus coming soon

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab expects to come out with a short list of finalists for a potential second campus within in the next few weeks.
The lab issued a request for proposals that was due March 4 that drew 21 proposals from sites in cities including Berkeley, Emeryville, Oakland, Alameda, Richmond, Albany, Walnut Creek and Dublin.
The lab had stated previously that it would release a shortlist by mid-April, said spokesman Jon Weiner.

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab draws 21 proposals for second campus

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab received 21 proposals for where to plant a potential second campus.
The lab issued its request for proposals in January with a deadline of March 4. The RFP calls for a site that can accommodate up to 2 million square feet of lab, office and research and development space including a 3,000 foot long building. The site must be within 25 minutes of the lab’s existing campus in the Berkeley Hills. Other criteria include proximity to transit and other amenities.
The RFP has created a major buzz among cities and developers since the second campus has the potential to facilitate hundreds of jobs and spin-offs and energize underutilized sites or sites seeking a major tenant.

Research Track: Salmonella to new anti-viral treatments: Eat me

Research Track — our weekly online feature of great science coming out of Bay Area research institutions — returns this week with a number of reports about asthma, a knee injury biomarker and experiments that could lead to anti-viral treatments that swallow the Salmonella bacteria.

So read on. After all, turning great science ideas into great companies requires knowing about the ideas in the first place.