SRN NEWS

Oct 2 (Reuters) – The US FDA has extended its review of Novo Nordisk’s experimental hemophilia A drug due to ongoing remediation work at a manufacturing facility, the Danish drugmaker said on Friday. Here are some details: • The company was seeking the US Food and Drug Administration’s approval for denecimig to treat adults and children with hemophilia A, with or without inhibitors, a rare condition that prevents the blood from clotting properly. • Novo had submitted the application for denecimig in September 2025 and was expecting an FDA decision in the third quarter of 2026. • While the regulator has not yet set a new timeline for its decision, Novo said the FDA did not raise any concerns regarding the safety or effectiveness data from the drug’s clinical trials. • The company said the manufacturing site issues do not impact any of its other medicines currently on the market. • “Novo is already in the process of addressing the FDA’s requests as efficiently as possible and continuing to work closely with the agency,” CEO Mike Doustdar said in a statement. • The company said it still aims to launch denecimig in the US in the first half of 2027, subject to regulatory approval. • The delay would not affect its 2026 financial forecast, Novo said. (Reporting by Kamal Choudhury in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

By Aditya Soni and Edmund Lee Oct 2 (Reuters) – The Trump administration’s changing visa policies caused a sharp drop in international applications to Columbia University and contributed to the university pausing admissions to one of its journalism programs, four people familiar with the matter said.  The journalism school announced on Thursday it was pausing admissions to its Master of Arts offering to conduct a “critical evaluation,” without giving further details about the reasons.  Jelani Cobb, the journalism school’s dean, said admissions to its Master of Arts program would pause for one year while the school reworked a degree created in 2005, when the “journalism marketplace looked different.” “The dynamics of visas and all those other kinds of things were part of the consideration,” Cobb told Reuters. Additionally, the department needs time to think through changes to the program, he added.  The connection between the admissions pause and US visa policies has not been previously reported, nor has the length of the admissions pause. The drop in international applications shows how uncertainty over President Donald Trump’s visa policies is affecting one of the preeminent US journalism institutions, which also administers the profession’s highest US honor, the Pulitzer Prize. The people did not disclose the exact size of the drop in applications. Last year, the Trump administration temporarily halted new student-visa appointments, then resumed them with expanded screening of applicants’ online activity, saying the checks were needed to identify potential threats to US national security. Columbia was among the universities targeted by his administration over pro-Palestinian campus protests in 2024. Last year, it agreed to pay over $200 million to settle federal investigations and regain most of its suspended federal funding. A new rule this year also sought to limit how long foreign students and journalists could stay in the US without seeking extensions, but a federal judge blocked it before it took effect last month, calling its rationale “exceptionally weak.”  RELIANCE ON INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS  Visa difficulties and immigration policy uncertainty have deterred prospective Columbia journalism students from abroad, the four people said, requesting anonymity to discuss its admissions. International students make up roughly half of the M.A. program’s enrollment, the people said. Kaushik Raj, an Indian journalist admitted to Columbia’s separate M.S. program in data journalism, was denied a US student visa last year, the Intercept reported. His rejection letter said he had not shown sufficient ties to India to establish he would return after his studies, according to the report. Geared toward mid-career journalists seeking expertise in subjects such as politics, business and science, the M.A. program is smaller than the Master of Science program aimed at students with less journalism experience. The school is not pausing the MS program. Lower enrollment has prompted changes to the M.A. program, including the combination of science and politics seminars in the 2024-25 academic year, two of the people familiar with the matter said. On Thursday, the school also announced a two-year, part-time online M.S. program. The move could allow Columbia to enroll international students without visas, but Cobb said it was unrelated to the M.A. admissions pause because the programs serve different students. CHANGING DYNAMICS OF JOURNALISM The M.A. pause comes as news organizations grapple with AI’s potential to reshape how stories are produced and found, while falling search traffic piles pressure on their business. Last year, at least 3,434 journalism jobs were cut in the UK and US, according to a Press Gazette tracker. The BBC and CBS News have announced layoffs this year. Some journalists took to social media on Thursday to criticize the M.A. program as too short and too expensive. The course spans nine months and Columbia estimates the cost of attendance at $120,000 before financial aid. The year-long M.S. in Data Journalism costs about $180,000. Two of the people familiar with the matter said the financial assistance made tuition less of a deterrent because most students receive financial aid. About 80% of the students receive financial aid, including grants, loans, or scholarships from institutional, federal and private funds, according to its website. Cobb said the journalism school wants to create a new fundraising strategy for the M.A. program and is considering starting a part-time version. (Reporting by Aditya Soni in San Francisco and Edmund Lee in New York; Editing by Rod Nickel) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

WASHINGTON, Oct 2 (Reuters) – Elon Musk’s xAI on Friday persuaded a US federal appeals court to halt Minnesota’s first-in-the-nation ban on AI-generated fake nude images as the technology and social media company pursues a lawsuit alleging that the law is unconstitutional. The St. Louis-based 8th US Circuit Court of Appeals in its order put the law on hold for now, granting a request for an injunction by xAI. A lower court judge last month had rejected Musk’s bid for an order stopping the law. The state’s anti-“nudification” law, which took effect on August 1, prohibits website operators, software developers and others from allowing users to create realistic ​images depicting an intimate body part that is not shown in an original photo of an ​identifiable individual. xAI alleges the measure restricts free ​speech protected by the US Constitution. Minnesota and xAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment. US District Judge Donovan Frank ruled last month that xAI had not shown it would suffer irreparable harm while challenging the law and said the company had waited too long to seek emergency relief. In its appeal, xAI disputed the judge’s finding that it delayed bringing suit. The company also said its Grok Imagine tool includes “rigorous protections” against creating nudified or sexualized images of real people. xAI has ​begun suing users whom it alleges are evading Grok’s technological blockers to create sexual images of people without their consent. Minnesota had urged the appeals court not to block the law. The state has said it adopted the measure this year to combat the ​spread of what it ​called a “staggering amount (of) child ⁠sexual abuse material that AI products like Grok Imagine generate.” (Reporting by Mike Scarcella; Editing by David Bario and David Gregorio) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

By Nandita Bose and Timothy Gardner Oct 2 (Reuters) – US President Donald Trump said on Friday he did not “jump the gun” on announcing a South Korean investment in Alaska LNG, a liquefied natural gas project that has been planned for decades but still lacks binding commitments. Trump unveiled plans on Wednesday for South Korea to invest $200 billion in US projects, but Seoul quickly suggested one key element, a $54 billion pipeline for a long-planned LNG project in Alaska, was not yet set in stone. “I didn’t jump the gun. I mean, they were there and they were represented. And let’s see, if they don’t want to do it, that’s okay with me. I’ll just charge them more,” he told reporters at the White House.  Trump also said on Friday that the US trade deal with South Korea includes $8.4 billion for a project to push out crude from an aging oilfield, although state-supported Yonhap news agency reported that an official from Seoul’s industry ministry was surprised​ by the claim. The official said the agreement is limited ​to what was in a joint fact sheet that Seoul and Washington released in November 2025. Press officials at the South Korea embassy in Washington could not be immediately reached for comment. Trump’s push to steer the ​South Korean investment into Alaska LNG is putting a fresh focus on a project that would cost more than twice as much as a comparable US Gulf Coast plant. The project involves constructing a pipeline stretching over 800 miles (​1,300 km) from the North Slope to an LNG liquefaction facility in Alaska’s southern port of Nikiski. Trump said South Korea’s $200 billion investment would include the construction of eight large nuclear power plants, a natural gas pipeline and a 6-gigawatt power plant in Texas. That announcement amounted to the first set of major projects under a broader $350 billion strategic investment package South Korea made as part of a trade agreement with Washington last year. (Reporting by Nandita Bose, Daphne Psaledakis and Timothy Gardner; Writing by Timothy Gardner and Christian Martinez; editing by Michelle Nichols and Nia Williams) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

WASHINGTON, Oct 2 (Reuters) – US President Donald Trump said on Friday that he will not authorize an export ban on diesel, hours after G7 countries agreed to release diesel and crude oil from their emergency reserves. (Reporting by Nandita Bose, Daphne Psaledakis and Ismail Shakil) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com