NEW PRODUCTSNatureWorks, Minnetonka, announced a capital investment project at its Blair, Neb., manufacturing facility for production of new grades of Ingeo biopolymers and a new generation of lactide intermediates. Samples of those products will be available next year with commercial sales staring by 2013. Made from plants, not oil, Ingeo is the biopolymer fueling a new generation of low-carbon-footprint fibers and plastic products. The Blair facility also will offer in commercial quantities a high-purity, polymer-grade lactide rich in the stereoisomer meso-lactide. Identified as Ingeo M700 lactide, the new material can be used as an intermediate for copolymers, amorphous oligomers and polymers, grafted substrates, resin additives/modifiers, adhesives, coatings, elastomers, surfactants, thermosets and solvents.

Bloomington-based Video Guidance installed a video communications system at University of Minnesota Amplatz Children's Hospital to connect young patients with their families. Video Guidance's stationary and mobile video conference initiative includes 21 in-room systems spread among the children's hospital's fourth, fifth and sixth floors. Additionally, three mobile videoconferencing carts will primarily be used in the pediatric intensive care units or neonatal intensive care units, but will also serve patients throughout the hospital.