The 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to Osamu Shimomura of the Marine Biological Laboratory (Woods Hole, MA, USA), Martin Chalfie of Columbia University (New York) and Roger Y. Tsien of the University of California, San Diego, for the discovery and development of green fluorescent protein (GFP). Shimomura first isolated GFP from the jellyfish Aequorea victoria and discovered that it glowed bright green under ultraviolet light; Chalfie demonstrated the value of GFP as a luminous genetic tag for various biological phenomena; and Tsien contributed to the understanding of how GFP fluoresces. He also introduced fluorescent red, yellow and orange protein tags that can be used to visualize complex molecular interactions occurring within living cells (Nat. Biotechnol. 22, 1567–1572, 2004). The journal also published the molecular structure of GFP (Nat. Biotechnol. 14, 1246–1251, 1996).

BG Medicine (Waltham, MA, USA) has named Carol Adiletto vice president of clinical and regulatory affairs. She previously served as senior vice president of clinical operations and regulatory affairs at WorldCare Clinical and vice president of clinical and regulatory at Inverness Medical Innovations.

Shabbir Anik has joined Althea Technologies (San Diego) as president and CEO. Anik is the former president of pharmaceutical development services at Patheon and also served as senior director of pharmaceutical development and operations for Neurex.

William Ardrey, CEO of Brisbane, Australia-based Avantogen has been appointed to the board of directors of Hawaii Biotech (Aiea, HI, USA). Avantogen is a significant investor in Hawaii Biotech and, after recently raising $1 million in capital, announced its intention to purchase additional shares in the company.

Pervasis Therapeutics (Cambridge, MA, USA) has announced the appointment of Frederic Chereau as president and CEO. Chereau was formerly the vice president and general manager of Genzyme Cardiovascular, a Genzyme business unit. He also served as COO of MG Biotherapeutics, a Genzyme and Medtronic joint venture formed to develop cellular therapies for cardiac repair.

John Dawson has been appointed as Oxford BioMedica's (Oxford, UK) permanent CEO, having served as acting CEO since August of this year. He joined the company as a nonexecutive director in 2008 after holding senior management positions in the European operations of Cephalon, including CFO and head of business development for Europe.

Aldagen (Durham, NC, USA) has named Lyle Hohnke to its board of directors. Hohnke has over 35 years of healthcare industry experience, having been a partner of Tullis Dickerson, a healthcare-focused venture capital fund, since 1994. He previously headed R&D in digestive diseases at Pfizer Central Research and later joined the University of Connecticut Health Center as vice president for research. He currently serves on the board of several private and public companies.

Eric Lang has been appointed vice president of clinical research at Javelin Pharmaceuticals (Cambridge, MA, USA). He was most recently the global head of clinical research and development for analgesia for Novartis's consumer health division.

Tracon Pharmaceuticals (San Diego) has announced the appointment of Bryan Leigh as chief medical officer. He previously served in the same capacity at Paramount Biosciences and has also held positions at Genentech, IDEC Pharmaceuticals and Biogen Idec.

CyDex Pharmaceuticals (Lenexa, KS, USA) has announced the appointment of Theron (Ted) E. Odlaug as president and CEO, succeeding John M. Siebert, who has retired from his positions as CEO and chairman of the board of directors. Siebert will remain a consultant to the company to aid in the transition. Odlaug joined CyDex as president and COO in May 2008. In addition, CyDex's board has elected director James C. Gale as its new chairman.

Oxitec (Oxford, UK) has appointed Hadyn Parry (right) as CEO, succeeding David Brooks. Parry has spent the past 15 years at Zeneca/Syngenta in capacities such as general manager of Zeneca Plant Sciences and European director and global head of R&D for Advanta, one of the world's largest seed companies. More recently, he served as CEO of MNL Pharmaceuticals. Brooks, who had served as chairman and CEO since 2002, will remain as Oxitec's chairman.

Melvin K. Spigelman, a director of Synergy Pharmaceuticals (New York) has been appointed as president and CEO of the Global Alliance for TB Drug Development, a not-for-profit product development partnership seeking to develop new drugs to treat tuberculosis. He previously served as director of R&D for the Global Alliance for TB Drug Development.

Mark Sutherland has joined GenVault (Carlsbad, CA, USA) as senior vice president of business development. He has more than 25 years experience in life sciences business development, sales and marketing, and comes to GenVault from the discovery systems business unit of GE Healthcare where he served as vice president, strategic alliances.

David F. Williams (right) has joined the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine (Winston-Salem, NC, USA) as professor and director of international affairs. He will work to establish exchange programs with scientists and students as well as identify potential joint ventures and collaborations. Williams formerly directed the United Kingdom Centre for Tissue Engineering and is currently editor in chief of Biomaterials, the leading journal in the field.