UA spinoff gets $3M for valley fever work

May 11, 2010

By hammersmith

[Source: Arizona Daily Star] – A drug company spun off by University of Arizona researchers has been awarded $3 million by the National Institutes of Health to continue development of a cure for valley fever, which sickens 150,000 people yearly, two-thirds of them in Arizona.

Valley Fever Solutions Inc. is an outgrowth of the UA’s Valley Fever Center for Excellence. It was created in 2008, in part to gain regulatory approval for nikkomycin Z, or Nik Z, a promising cure for the ailment.

Dr. John Galgiani, director of the center and chief medical officer for the company, said the money will be used over the next year to begin producing the drug with a new process that should make it more economical.

For more information: UA spinoff gets $3M for valley fever work