Business

A pair of vacant low-rise office buildings in Rockville recently changed ownership and will be converted to life science labs, illustrating yet again the persistent demand for biotech space in Montgomery County. The buildings at 1500 and 1550 Research Blvd sit on a 7.5-acre property, dubbed Research Square. Between one and three stories and totaling about 85,000 square feet, they’d formed part of a larger campus that’s home to Westat Inc., a research firm.

Greater Washington’s life sciences cluster just got the silver medal for talent, beating out other major hubs, including one of its biggest rivals, in a moment of critical growth for the local industry. The D.C. metro ranks second only to the Boston-Cambridge region, notably edging out the San Francisco Bay Area, in a new report from commercial real estate services firm CBRE examining the state of the life sciences workforce across the country.

The mound of oyster shells rose 20 feet above the deck of a 72-foot barge Wednesday afternoon, ready to plunge into the depths of the Severn River. As it positioned itself in the waters off Chinks Point, the oyster-planting barge Robert Lee opened its side rails and pumped hundreds of thousands of oyster shells covered in millions of thumbprint-sized juvenile oysters into the river with a high-powered hose, a process known as “washing.” GPS trackers attached to some of the shells ensure they are landing in the right locations to take root on the reef below.

Baltimore region — with renewable energy. PNC on Wednesday announced a 15-year agreement with clean energy company Constellation Energy Corp. PNC (NYSE: PNC) will receive approximately 148 million kilowatt hours of energy per year through its retail agreement with Constellation (NASDAQ: CEG). That energy will be matched by Green-e Energy Certified Renewable Energy Certificates sourced from other renewable facilities located throughout the U.S.

The commission charged with crafting regulations for Maryland’s emerging sports betting industry is dropping race- and gender-based criteria — for now — as it seeks to move the process forward. The Sports Wagering Application Review Commission, or SWARC, voted Wednesday to approve a set of draft regulations and application forms for prospective mobile and Class B facility sportsbook operators.

Maryland casinos pulled in $162.7 million last month, a slight uptick compared with a year ago. Sports betting handles in the state, meanwhile, continued to fall in relation to recent months, as a commission forges ahead on opening new avenues for wagering. Total revenues from slots and table games at Maryland’s six casinos increased by 0.8% compared with June of 2021, according to the latest numbers released by Maryland Lottery and Gaming.

A health center serving older patients in West Baltimore will open next year at the former Target at Mondawmin Mall, part of a vision to redevelop the shuttered store into a community hub designed to spur neighborhood revitalization. The site has been selected as the location for the federal Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly, or PACE, which offers care to people who qualify for nursing home placement but live in their own homes, organizers said Wednesday.

Morgan State University has partnered with Pfizer, the New York-based pharmaceutical company best known for its COVID-19 vaccine and its COVID-19 treatment medication, Paxlovid, to offer a new fellowship in vaccines medical development. The fellowship, which will be available to students in Morgan’s Doctor of Public Health Program, is the company’s first doctoral fellowship program and first fellowship program at a historically Black college or university.

The Biden administration is warning pharmacies not to discriminate against women who may seek reproductive health prescriptions, including some that might be involved in ending a pregnancy. The Department of Health and Human Services said Wednesday that pharmacies receiving federal money from programs such as Medicare and Medicaid cannot discriminate in how they supply medications or advise patients on prescriptions.