It could be a long way off before we can take a 'caveolin pill' to fix our livers after a big night out, but a recent breakthrough by collaborating scientists in Brisbane and Barcelona has brought the possibility a little closer, as Fiona Wylie reports.

Melbourne's CSL (ASX:CSL) today reported a net profit after tax of AUD$176.4 million for the first half of the financial year, up 34 per cent from the previous first half, and has upgraded its full year profit forecast by about 15 per cent to $335 to $350 million.

Brisbane cancer drug developer Progen Industries (ASX:PGL) managing director Lewis Lee has resigned, and the company has named his replacement -- one-time Monsanto executive Justus Homburg.

To no one's surprise, CSL has become the dominant force in the Australian biotechnology sector. Graeme O'Neill learns from CSL's chief scientist, Andrew Cuthbertson, about the solid research that will drive the company in the next few years.

Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon might have spared himself and his men the travails of their fruitless and ultimately fatal quest for the fountain of youth in the Caribbean in 1513 by staying at home in and quaffing the genuine article from oak barrels in his wine cellar, writes Graeme O'Neill.

The ASX has issued a 'please explain' to Brisbane-based Analytica (ASX:ALT), querying whether the company will have enough cash to last it past the next quarter.

G2 Therapies, a spin-off company from Sydney's Garvan Institute of Medical Research, has signed a licensing agreement worth up to AUD$137 million with Denmark's Novo Nordisk to develop, manufacture and commercialise new anti-inflammatory therapies based on G2's C5a receptor antibodies.

Sydney-based Genesis Biomedical (ASX:GBL) has closed its underwritten share offer early and oversubscribed raising AUD$2.4 million, substantially boosting its coffers -- the firm had $586,000 at the end of the quarter.

Biosensor Enterprises (BEL) will no longer work to develop Sydney-based Ambri's (ASX:ABI) ion-channel switch (ICS), and will instead focus on out-licensing the technology.

Dr Stephen Nutt, based at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, and Dr Anthony Hannan, at the Howard Florey Institute, have each been awarded five-year grants of AUD$1 million under the Pfizer Australia Research Fellowship scheme.

Hip replacement specialist Portland Orthopaedics (ASX:PLD) has listed on the ASX today at AUD$0.28, three cents above its issue price of $0.25.