Neither company will comment on its work, but Pfizer recently published an animal study showing that a leukotriene blocker called CP-105, 696 shrank artery plaques dramatically in mice that were fed the compound for 35 days, as compared with a control group that didn't get the compound.

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Mullet, bishop of a group living on a compound outside Bergholz, wanted to "seek revenge and punish the departing families, " according to an FBI affidavit filed before the trial.

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Its first client, the French biotech firm Cytomics, hired the group for a recipe to synthesize a cancer-fighting compound.

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Shares in Lilly, the company whose stock is expected to be most affected by its trial results, could lose 10% of their value if the company's compound doesn't meet all its study targets in October, estimates Mark Schoenebaum, an ISI Group pharmaceuticals and biotechnology analyst who gives solanezumab a 15% chance of success.

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One compound synthesised by Dr Blackwell's team is more effective than the natural signalling chemical at turning on this group behaviour and works even when there are not enough bacteria around to induce the process naturally.

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