Tech Transfer, Universities, startups

State Awards Program Aims to Hasten Technologies’ Journey From Lab to Market

Robert Buderi 2/6/08

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institutions. The biggest winner was Northeastern University: three of the school’s researchers won awards.

—Carmen Barnés, Vascular Biology Program, Children’s Hospital Boston

Barnés will used the MTTC award to help develop a test for measuring blood levels of a hormone involved in premature birth, pre-eclampsia, and other disorders that affect newborns’ health. (This proposal was submitted by Judah Folkman)

—Robert N. Hanson, Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Northeastern University

Hanson is developing a technique for imaging breast cancers that will reveal the hormone responsiveness of the tumors. Determining hormone responsiveness—which usually requires a biopsy—is an important step in planning how to treat the cancer.

—Paul B. Yu, Division of Cardiology, Massachusetts General Hospital

Yu’s team is studying a novel drug aimed at treating calcification of blood vessels—a major contributor to heart disease and death.

—Vladimir Torchilin, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Northeastern University

Torchilin’s group will use its award to make more stable solutions of existing cancer drugs that are poorly soluble. It’s hoped that the technique, in which nanoparticles of the drugs are coated with thin polymer shells, will improve the bioavailability and efficacy of the drugs.

—T. F. Morse, The Photonics Center, Boston University

This project aims to vastly improve the sensitivity and resolution of digital x-ray imaging using nanoparticle-embedded fiber optics.

—Louis Goodman, School of Marine Science and Technology (SMAST), UMass Dartmouth

Goodman’s award will aid the development of a “Hybrid Programmable Underwater Profiler”—a low-cost tool for performing ocean measurements.

—Gregory J. Kowalski, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Northeastern University, and Dale N. Larson, Bioengineering Department, Charles Stark Draper Laboratory

Kowalski and Larson are developing a smaller, faster biocalorimeter using photonic technology. Such a device could help reduce drug-development cost and risk, the researchers say.

—Peter R. Girguis, Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University

This award will support the fabrication of a commercially viable prototype of a microbial fuel cell to be used in urban and rural power systems.

—Jie Song, Department of Orthopedics, UMass Medical School

“Shape Memory Polymeric Bone Substitutes”

Song’s team will use its MTTC award to optimize bone substitutes developed in the lab. The substitutes, which incorporate shape-memory polymers, will be used in rodent studies to patch skeletal defects, hopefully generating data supporting the feasibility of using the substitute in orthopedic applications.