Drug maker takes over firm’s goats
GTC Biotherapeutics Inc., a Framingham company that made news in February by becoming the first biotechnology firm to win federal approval to manufacture a drug by using genetically modified animals, said it will assume control of transgenic goats that had been developed for Merrimack Pharmaceuticals Inc., a privately held Cambridge company.
Merrimack’s goats yield a substance that could be used in potential treatments of such diseases as multiple sclerosis and myasthenia gravis, GTC said.
In February, GTC won approval to manufacture a drug called ATryn, used for treating patients with hereditary antithrombin deficiency, a life-threatening condition during surgery or childbirth. To make ATryn, GTC engineered a herd of goats to secrete a special therapeutic protein in their milk. 