ATLANTA—Greg Foster, who joined Atlanta-based venture firm Noro-Moseley as a general partner in March, says the Southeast is ripe for digital media start-ups and the infrastructure companies that support them. “A lot of great consumer-facing digital media companies will emerge from the Southeast,” he says, “but I’m even more bullish on the infrastructure enablement plays.”

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC—Athenix, a company developing technologies for genetic control of agricultural pests and industrial products such as biofuels, has raised a new $10 million round from investors including Hunt Ventures, Intersouth Partners and Polaris Venture Partners.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — University of Florida and Florida Institute of Technology engineering researchers have narrowed the search for the source of X-rays emitted by lightning, a feat that could one day help predict where lightning will strike.

MCLEAN, VA–Duke Chung, CEO of Parature, a company selling hosted, on-demand online support desk software, says Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) still sells largely to small and medium-sized businesses, but is increasingly accepted by buyers.

ATLANTA--A way to turn off one gene at a time has earned acceptance in biology laboratories over the last decade. Doctors envision the technique, called RNA interference, as a tool to treat a variety of diseases if it can be adapted to humans.

WASHINGTON, DC – LivingSocial.com, a network where people can share reviews and common interests, has raised a $5 million A round led by Grotech Ventures with a personal investment from Steve and Jean Case.

VIENNA, VA—Appian, a company selling business process management software, has raised $10 million from Novak Biddle Venture partners, its first venture round in its nine-year history.

GAINESVILLE, FL — Having fun in the workplace is no joke when it comes to boosting employee productivity, a new University of Florida study finds.

FAIRFAX, VA—Though many policymakers have argued that environmental regulations can negatively impact an organization’s bottom line, a new study by George Mason University researcher Nicole Darnall shows that companies that develop green production processes can not only offset the costs of regulations, but can also reap further benefits.

RALEIGH, NC –Andy Beal, the top Internet marketing consultant, founder of online reputation management company Trackur, and editor of the award-winning Marketing Pilgrim blog, says that for the next decade, the future of search is mostly spelled Google.

CHARLOTTE, NC –Carousel Capital and company management have acquired Fort Mill, SC-based Mergent, which sells business and financial data on global public and private companies, from Xinhua Finance, the Chinese financial information provider.

DURHAM, N.C. – New research into the earliest events occurring immediately upon infection with HIV-I shows that the virus deals a stunning blow to the immune system earlier than was previously understood.

BIRMINGHAM, AL – A Birmingham investment firm has found gold nuggets in the foothills of the Internet. Founders Investment Banking Managing Director Zane Tarence says the advertising industry’s desire for niche audiences and trackable responses to its campaigns has made some Web sites reaching those audiences extremely valuable.

WASHINGTON, DC –Former AOL execs Ted Leonsis and Steve Case and venture capitalist Miles Gilburne have launched SnagFilms, to promote viral distribution of documentaries via virtual movie theatre widgets. Also, the new company has acquired indieWIRE, a popular hub for the independent film industry.

HERNDON, VA - Center for Innovative Technology’s GAP Fund has invested $100,000 in MiserWare, Inc., a Blacksburg, VA-based software startup that figures to be a leading player in the "Green IT" movement.

BIRMINGHAM, AL - Working hard when fatigued may be admired by many Americans, but it is a virtue that could be harmful to one's health, according to new research by psychologists at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB).

GREENSBORO, NC –Things fizzled pretty quickly for the startup company attempted at the first Startup Weekend event held in the Research Triangle area last year, but that’s not the case this year. Scavenja, a photo-based scavenger hunt with prizes, for instance, has already started a new game online and will be looking for funding.

BALTIMORE, MD - Scientists plan to use new technology to take advantage of recent, promising ideas on where to search for possible extraterrestrial intelligence in our galaxy.

MIAMI—When it comes to medical connectedness, “We’re still in the Dark Ages,” says Jeffrey Wolf, CEO of GenerationOne, a company that plans to wirelessly connect health professionals and patients to a wellness system. The company emerged from two years of product development last week.

DULUTH, GA—Brightreee, a company selling business management software for the home medical equipment and sleep therapy markets, has received a “significant investment” from Battery Ventures.

Today’s rapidly-changing technological environment mandates that companies continually revise and refine their innovations to keep up with their markets. Fortunately, the patent laws provide several ways for companies to protect evolving technologies without having to draft a new patent application from scratch.

AUGUSTA, GA – Inhibiting a growth factor that keeps muscles from getting too big may optimize recovery of injured soldiers, researchers at the Medical College of Georgia say.

RALEIGH, NC –About 50 regional entrepreneurs banged around ideas and code for 54 hours under the watchful eyes of NBC/CNBC cameras at Startup Weekend in Raleigh from Friday through Sunday, and launched four new Web-based companies. NBC plans to air a two-minute piece on the event Friday.

ALPHARETTA, GA – OpenSpan Inc., a company selling desktop productivity and service oriented architecture acceleration software, has closed a $13 million C round co-led by FTVentures and Globespan Capital Partenrs.

ATLANTA - Human cancer cells divide and conquer. Unless physicians can control that division with surgery, chemotherapy or radiation, the wildly dividing cells will eventually destroy a person's life. Now, University of Georgia researchers have found a promising new way to potentially halt that deadly proliferation.

FORT MYERS, FL – A number of companies offer ways to share Web pages and comment on them, but Slingpage, a Fort Myers company that launched its public beta last month, has a new approach to the idea. It allows users of its software to share Web pages in real-time and interact with the receiver, all from their browser.

BIRMINGHAM, AL - As unwelcome as they are, higher gasoline prices do come with a plus side - fewer deaths from car accidents, says a researcher at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB).

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Farm-raised tilapia, one of the most highly consumed fish in America, has very low levels of beneficial omega-3 fatty acids and, perhaps worse, very high levels of omega-6 fatty acids, according to new research from Wake Forest University School of Medicine.

CHAPEL HILL, NC - TechJournal South, the Southeast's leading technology business publication, in cooperation with Southern Capitol Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm, announce Internet Summit 08, an interactive conference featuring high-level experts discussing the present and future of internet oriented business issues and trends.

ARLINGTON, VA – Starfish Retention Solutions, which develops software to promote student success in higher education, has raised a $3.15 million first round led by Novak Biddle Partners.

CLEMSON, SC - Clemson-based PinPoint GeoTech, a technology company which sells governmental agencies product suite that saves time and money, while reducing greenhouse emissions, has received a $200,000 investment from SCRA affiliate SC Launch.

KNOXVILLE, TN—With the IPO window closed and nearly 2000 document destruction companies out there, the time is ripe for consolidation, says Mike West, who recently launched 3GS along with CEO Mike Boehringer to do just that. “We closed a deal in Mobile, Alabama yesterday, will close another in Atlanta Thursday, and another in the Southeast next week,” West says.

NEW YORK—Despite woes in the buyout market, private equity fund-raising continues to hold its ground, while venture fund raising actually increased in the first half of 2008.

DURHAM, NC – Scientists will soon have a new resource to help them develop tools to more quickly spot potential safety problems while developing new drugs.

GAINSVILLE, FL—Schoolchildren may love field trips, but they’re costly to schools and the environment. Andrea Shoemaker, CEO of Virtual Xploration, says replacing them with virtual 3D trips are inherently more educational and don’t require the busing that just pumps more pollutants into the air.

GERMANTOWN, MD—Eka Systems, which makes wireless sensor products for “smart” metering for gas, water, and electric utilities has raised an $18.5 million B round. Investors include Angeleno Group, RockPort Capital Partners, The Westly Group and Metropolitan Investment.

When I sit down to write a column about Tech Culture, I’m usually trying to make you laugh while imparting some kind of useful nugget that you can apply to your day to day (gadgets is fun!). Today, I take a different tack.

AUGUSTA, GA—A small protein may have a big role in helping you make more bone and less fat, researchers say.

MORRISVILLE, NC—F-Origin, which closed a $5 million third round of capital a few months ago, sees eBook readers such as Amazon’s Kindle as a natural market for its touchscreen technology, which provides tactile user feedback. But the company already has orders from a mobile phone company, a firm making touchscreen picture frames, and a point-of-service kiosk product maker.

ATLANTA—Oversight Systems, a company selling automated transaction monitoring software that detects errors and fraud, has called down $10.2 million of a $13.2 million B round according to a regulatory filing. Investors include Adobe Ventures, Granite Ventures and Sigma Partners.

AUGUSTA, GA - When a mouse's immune system is deciding whether to reject a skin graft, one powerful member of a molecular family designed to provoke such a response can effectively reduce the visibility of the mouse's own cells and help the graft survive, researchers say.

ATLANTA—The strongest predictor of whether or not a landlord is likely to have trouble with a renter meeting obligations is the renter’s previous payment history. That’s the key idea behind RentBureau, which has more than 5 million records in 45 states from major apartment rental companies.

Technology originally developed by the University of Florida (UF) for NASA will be used to help Minnesota-based American Crystal Sugar Co. efficiently recycle sugar beet tailings into methane gas, a burnable energy source.

AUGUSTA, GA - A blue curing light used to harden dental fillings also may stunt tumor growth, Medical College of Georgia researchers say.

DURHAM, NC-- CoLucid Pharmaceuticals Inc., a biotechnology company focusing on therapies for central nervous system disorders, has closed a $25 million Series B financing. New investor Care Capital led the round, which included previous investors Pappas Ventures, Domain Associates, Pearl Street Venture Funds and Triathlon Medical Ventures.

CHARLOTTE, NC—Frontier Capital, a private equity firm providing growth equity to business services companies, has invested $7.75 million in DAXKO Inc., a company selling on-demand software to nonprofits.

WINSTON-SALEM, NC – Scientists at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center are about to embark on a human trial to test whether a new cancer treatment will be as effective at eradicating cancer in humans as it has proven to be in mice.

ATLANTA—ATM Direct, which just won the $100,000 Georgia Business Launch competition, says its alternative online payment method offers two distinct advantages over others.

Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered a clue to how dysentery parasite might evade immune system.

ATLANTA—While the $100,000 top prize in the Georgia Business Launch competition lures participants, even those who neither win nor make the final cut benefit from the process, says Sid Elliott of the Georgia Research Alliance (GRA).

ATLANTA – ATM Direct won the $100,000 top prize in the third annual Georgia Business Launch Competition, sponsored by The Georgia Research Alliance (GRA) and the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG).

“People are beginning to figure out that Web sites are very complicated things that need to be maintained and upgraded regularly,” says Jeffrey Hoffman president, CEO, and founder of WebslingerZ, a North Carolina-based Web development firm established in 1995.

DURHAM, N.C. -- Perhaps judging a man by his cologne isn't as superficial as it seems. Duke University researchers have found that mammalian scent speaks volumes.

CHARLOTTE, NC - Duke Energy (NYSE:DUK) has acquired Catamount Energy Corporation in a deal worth about $240 million plus assumed debt, a transaction that will significantly increase Duke Energy's wind energy operations.

RESEARCH TRIANGLE, NC –Disraeli once said that there are three lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. After watching recent news coverage of the economic situation in the US and evaluating the isolated statistics that are often cited, one might think that the U.S. economy is in the midst of a dire recession.

Devices known as brain-machine interfaces could someday be used routinely to help paralyzed patients and amputees control prosthetic limbs with just their thoughts. University of Florida researchers have come up with a way for such devices to evolve with the brain as it learns.

ATLANTA - In the wake of a succession contaminated produce breakouts, University of Georgia researchers have developed an effective technology for reducing contamination of dangerous bacteria on food.

ORLANDO, FL –Mark Thomason, co-founder of iConvene, caught the travel bug while in the Navy from 1980 through 1986, as his ship pulled into ports along the Western Pacific, stopping in Australia, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, Tahiti, and “beautiful Bahrain in the Persian Gulf.”

RALEIGH, NC— rPath, a company enabling “cloud computing” via virtual appliances, has raised a $10 million C round led by its existing backers, General Catalyst, North Bridge Venture Partenrs, and Wakefield Group.

The Southeast Venture Conference (SEVC) today announces that the third annual Conference will be held March 11-12th 2009 at the Intercontinental Buckhead in Atlanta, Georgia.

WASHINGTON, DC – The Washington DC metro area added 6,100 jobs for an industry total of 295,800 workers in 2006, according to the most current metropolitan data available, says the AeA's 2008 Cybercities report.

RESEARCH TRIANGLE, NC - The high-tech employment in the combined metro area of Raleigh and Durham totaled 70,600 in 2006, according to the most current metropolitan data available, says the AeA 2008 Cybercities report.

ALPHARETTA, GA - The high-tech industry in Atlanta employed 126,700 people in 2006, the most current metropolitan data available, representing an increase of 2,300 jobs from the previous year, or two percent. So says the AeA's Cybercities report released today.

ATLANTA - Scientists at Emory University and the University of Washington in Seattle have succeeded in using nanotechnology known as quantum dots to usher gene therapy into the body.

ATLANTA—Glen Whitley, who took the helm as executive director of the AeA Southeast Council in April, says he wants to see the organization develop a broader outreach throughout the region.

DURHAM, NC—The rapid convergence of social networks, mobile phones and global positioning technology has given Duke University engineers the ability to create something they call "virtual sticky notes," site-specific messages that people can leave for others to pick up on their mobile phones.

Washington, DC—A synthetic chemical based on a compound found in cocoa beans slowed growth and accelerated destruction of human tumors in laboratory studies, and should be tested further for cancer chemoprevention or even treatment, say researchers at Georgetown University Medical Center.