Since the 18th century, several arsenic compounds have been used as medicines, including arsenic trioxide (ATO) which is commonly prescribed in the treatment of certain types of cancer. Although they prove to be effective, no one knows how these compounds work.

With the launch of its first call for proposals, the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) got underway on 30 April. Joining forces, the European Commission and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) hope to bring Europe back to the forefront of medical innovation.

The European Commission published a pan-European survey on electronic services in healthcare (eHealth) that shows 87% of European doctors (General Practitioners) use a computer, 48% with a broadband connection. European doctors increasingly store and send patients' data such as lab reports electronically.

The Doctor's Channel and Ozmosis announced a partnership to deliver an innovative approach to online medical knowledge exchange, combining The Doctor's Channel's original video content with physician-only discussions taking place on Ozmosis.

Healthcare professionals will soon be able to access the UK's leading drug knowledge base, the Multilex Drug Data File (Multilex DDF), on the move, following the development of a new drug reference application for mobile devices. First DataBank Europe (FDBE), working in partnership with Swedish software company MedHand International AB, will be offering the ability to browse Multilex DDF via a mobile device.

EU-funded scientists have developed a strategy to rapidly identify the genetic properties of virulent strains of bacteria. Such techniques will be essential in responding effectively to an epidemic of a new strain of a disease or a bioterrorist attack.

Developed in close cooperation between Transinsight, Dresden, and the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment, Berlin, the knowledge-based semantic search engine www.Go3R.org is now available online. It enables information transparency for the prevention of animal testing.