iBridge Network Innovations

Three-Component Immunogen Portfolio for Vaccines and Antibody Production

2012-05-16T21:43:02Z

In response to these issues, researchers at the University of Georgia and the Mayo Clinic have developed a portfolio of technologies surrounding a 3-component immunogen methodology. Components of this portfolio include:

Composition of matter for a fully synthetic carbohydrate-based vaccine

Method of producing hybridomas using a 3-component immunogen

Method of native chemical ligation of hydrophobic reactants in a lipid phase to produce multicomponent products

Tissue Repair Material Made with Polymer Sponges

2012-05-16T21:43:15Z

SUMMARY

Lehigh University has developed a novel process for producing a glass scaffold material suitable for use in bone repair. This process uses polymer sponges which are coated with sol-gel. While many bone scaffold technologies utilize ceramics, the process uses glass and is designed to optimize healing as well as improve the biodegradation rate. Lehigh Tech ID: #031510-01.

¹ “Bioactive Technologies for Bone Replacement,” Medical Devices Today web site,

http://www.medicaldevicestoday.com/2010/06/bioactive-technologies-for-bone-replacement.html, accessed September 2, 2010.

United States patent application US2008028036A1 has been filed on this technology.

THE MARKET

While tissue scaffold engineering for bone and cartilage repair may not be a new development, there is still an immediate window of opportunity for such technology. This is due not only to the size of the global bone replacement material market, which is around $2B as of 2010, but also due to the aging baby-boomer population and the need for more innovative and effective bone replacement and grafting techniques. There has also been a shift towards the biologics of bone healing and way from the mechanics of bone healing, further contributing to the growth of this market.

THE OPPORTUNITY

Lehigh University is interested in licensing this technology. Lehigh would also be interested in finding a co-development partner.

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Universal Fit Pediatric Nasal Interface for Delivery of Continuous Positive Airway Pressure

2012-05-16T21:43:26Z

Universal Fit Pediatric Nasal Interface for Delivery of Continuous Positive Airway Pressure

Basophil Activation Based Allergy Diagnostic Test

2012-05-16T21:43:37Z

Basophil Activation Based Allergy Diagnostic Test

Stable Integrin Alpha-v-Beta-6 Binding for Cancer Diagnostics and Treatment

2012-05-16T21:43:47Z

Stable Integrin Alpha-v-Beta-6 Binding for Cancer Diagnostics and Treatment

Discovery of new viral species in canines

2012-05-16T21:43:59Z

Lead Inventor: Walter Ian Lipkin M.D.

Tech Ventures Reference: IR 2801 and 2805

Problem or Unmet Need:
Canine parvovirus is the most common infectious disorder in the US for canines and is one of the recommended core vaccines by the American Veterinary Medical Associati…

Machine Learning Based Power Management Techniques

2012-05-16T21:44:13Z

This method uses a continuous learning process to achieve efficient and accurate communication in a dynamic environment and allow for more aggressive voltage scaling, achieving reduced power consumption.

Combined Channel And Hardware Noise Resilient (Forward Error Correction) Fec Decoders

2012-05-16T21:44:23Z

This new FEC decoder provides a single algorithm to handle both communication channel errors and hardware errors induced by aggressive voltage scaling, maximizing the likelihood of the received data.

Colloidal Gold Nanocrystals with Improved Solubility, Tunability, and Stability that Exhibit Rapid and Simple Precipitation via pH-Controlled Solutions

2012-05-16T21:44:32Z

Application

Highly stable and robust gold nanoparticles with a polymer coating that allows broad size tunability, permeability to small organic molecules, and fine control of solubility properties.

Key Benefits

Highly sensitive to pH levels which allow nanocrystals to be rapidly isolated, purified, and reconstituted by simply controlling the pH level of the solution.
Protected by polymer coating that makes it permeable to small organic molecules unlike other non-permeable, alkanethiol-protected gold nanoparticles.
Can be freeze-dried for long shelf-life and easily reconstituted with almost any solvent.
Can be produced on a large-scale in a one-step process using non-toxic and inexpensive materials.
May be used as a biomedical diagnostic, chemical catalyst, contrast agent in medical imaging and microscopy, and research tool for surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS).

Market Summary

Because of their unique optical, electronic, and molecular properties, gold nanocrystals have a wide-range of applications in a number of fields. Commercially available gold nanoparticles have a defined shelf-life, are provided only in solution (usually water), and cannot be transferred to other solvents. At present, there are two major approaches to produce gold nanocrystals. The first approach produces gold nanocrystals that are not well-protected, not stable, and prone to aggregation when stored or exposed to salts. The second approach yields highly stable nanocrystals however the range of tunable nanocrystal sizes are limited to 1-5 nanometers.

Technical Summary

Emory inventors have synthesized colloidal gold nanocrystals that are well-protected, stable, and tunable to a broad range of sizes. These gold nanocrystals are produced using polymer ligands that can form bonds at more than one point, which protect the nanocrystal, allow for broad size tunability, and exhibit pH-sensitive surface properties including solubility control via controlling surface charge or via irreversibly shedding the outer layer of the nanocrystal (see image). Specifically, when the solution pH containing the nanocrystals is lowered by only 0.6 units (i.e. from pH 4.85 to 4.25), the nanocrystals transition from soluble to insoluble in polar solvents thereby allowing for rapid isolation and purification. When their outer layer is shed, the gold nanocrystals become soluble in nonpolar organic solvents as well. Unlike the tightly packed monolayers of alkanethiols on gold that inhibit permeability, the polymer coatings on these gold nanocrystals provide permeability to small organic molecules which may increase the applications of gold nanocrystals in biomedical detection, chemical catalysis, and surface-enhanced Raman scattering.

Developmental Stage

These gold nanocrystals have been synthesized and described.

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Unique Compound Inhibits Angiogenesis in Cancer and Eye Diseases

2012-05-16T21:57:49Z

Because uncontrolled growth of blood vessels (angiogenesis) contributes to the progression of diverse diseases from cancer to macular degeneration, drugs targeting the neovasculature are obvious candidates to control unwanted vascularization and tumor growth. However, most anti-angiogenic drugs must be taken up into the target cell in order to exert their effects. The availability of a potent drug that tackles angiogenesis via a different mode presents a valuable therapeutic strategy for diseases that depend on abnormal neovasculature.

Process Variation Aware Transcoding For Low Power H.264 Decoding

2012-05-16T21:57:23Z

This new method of transcoding can handle memory hardware errors, allowing for aggressive voltage scaling (lowering power use) without sacrificing the quality of streaming data services.

Synthetic Surfaces For Defined Human Cell Culture

2012-05-16T21:57:10Z

Researchers at UC Berkeley have developed a synthetic polymer interface for the long-term self-renewal of human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) in defined media. Current culture systems for hESCs require the use of isolated animal derived extracellular matrix proteins or mouse embryonic feeder cells. The proposed use of a completely synthetic cell culture substrate avoids the problems associated with the variability of and the exposure to animal products. The hydrogel network coating is comprised of aminopropylmethacrylamide (APMAAm) monomer and N,N-methylenebis(acrylamide) (bis) crosslinker that was grafted to standard tissue culture polystyrene (TCPS) dishes via photoinitiated addition polymerization. Results for hESC proliferation and pluripotency markers were both qualitatively and quantitatively similar to cells cultured on MatrigelÔ -coated substrates.

110105: Transformer-less Unified Power Flow Controller

2012-05-16T21:45:23Z

The ability to store and shift electrical power over time is becoming more important as economies increasingly adopt renewable power sources. Meshed AC power grids have limited controllability and cannot effectively handle congestion of key transmission lines during sporadic peaks and valleys of input power, such as that produced by solar and wind sources. Conventional unified power flow controllers (UPFCs) mitigate the congestion problem by balancing the load across transmission lines, but require expensive, large transformers with high losses. They are also inefficient at handling sporadic power inputs.

Michigan State University’s invention is a transformer-less UPFC. This allows the UPFC to be produced far more cheaply and take up less real estate than conventional UPFCs. In addition, it is much more efficient and better suited to handle highly dynamic current power inputs.

Benefits

* Cheaper than conventional UPFCs

* Less space required at load-balancing points in the grid

* Efficient under stable and sporadic power inputs—great for multiple or unpredictable power inputs such as solar and wind energy sources

Applications

* Power distribution for load balancing, especially where solar and wind supply power

Patent Status

Patent pending

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110081: High-Efficiency Power Transistor Gate Drive

2012-05-16T21:59:18Z

Gate-drive technology is traditionally an open-loop passive method that has no real-time control of a semiconductor power device’s switching speed, overshoot, and switching power losses. The technology is unreliable and cannot be optimized over different operating voltages and current conditions. It suffers high transient overshoots at voltage and current if gate resistance is reduced to minimize the switching loss. A technology that can decouple the two issues with a satisfactory solution is needed.

Michigan State University’s invention provides a current source-based, active, gate-drive circuit for power transistors such as IGBT (insulated-gate bipolar transistor) and MOSFET (metal oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor). The circuit consists of a current source to accelerate the change rate of voltage to reduce the switching loss, and a voltage-controlled current source to keep the change rate of the current at a proper level to limit the transient overshoots. The voltage signal used to control the current sources is derived from the change rate of the device current.

For example, during IGBT turn-on, the gate drive signal turns on the current source to charge up the gate voltage. Once the gate voltage reaches its steady state value, the current source gate driver is cut off to keep the gate voltage in its steady state value. Though the current source has a constant value, its amplitude can also be changed during the turn-on period.

Benefits

* Greater efficiency

* Greater reliability

* Reduces energy loss during switching

* Very low level transient overshoot of voltage and current

Applications

* Power grid

* Industrial uses

* Generators

* Electric vehicles

* Hybrid cars

Patent Status

Patent application in process

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Low complexity Out-of-Order Issue Logic using Static circuits

2012-05-16T22:23:30Z

Instruction-level parallelism (ILP) is a measure of how
many of the operations in a computer program can be performed simultaneously.
Superscalar techniques based on extracting instruction-level parallelism have
been a major contribution to high performance microprocessor design throughout
the last decade. The number of instructions executed per cycle (IPC) is
increased substantially through superscalar techniques like speculative
execution and dynamic scheduling. While speculative execution deals with control
dependencies, dynamic scheduling processes data dependencies and leverages the
stalls due to dependencies through out-of-order execution. The out-of-order
issue logic identifies if instruction operands are ready and selects the highest
priority ready instructions for execution. Despite these advantages however,
there is still demand for more efficient and less complex methods to resolve
issue logic complexity.

Researchers at Arizona State University have developed a new
method to reduce issue logic complexity. They have developed a novel issue logic
implementation that divides the instruction ready signals into groups and
selects the four highest priority instructions. By splitting the ready signals
into groups and processing them in parallel, the complexity of issuing multiple
instructions is reduced. The oldest first priority selection is used and the
wakeup, update and select operations are completed in a single cycle ensuring
high instructions per cycle (IPC). The select and update logic are implemented
using static combinational logic that aids in borrowing time from wakeup logic.
The design is implemented entirely in static CMOS circuits to reduce the power
dissipation and provide ease of implementation as well as process portability.
The method also reduces low fan out and improves circuit speed.

Potential Applications

Microprocessor manufacturers such as:

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD)
Intel
ARM
IBM
Broadcom Corporation

Benefits and Advantages

Less power consumption
Faster circuit speed
Simple architecture
Ease of implementation
Process portability

Download Original PDF
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Novel method to enhance the efficacy of cisplatin

2012-05-16T21:58:09Z

Investigators have discovered that cisplatin and a novel protein inhibitor appear to act synergistically to kill breast cancer cell lines.

Oxygen Transport Compounds For Use as Novel Stroke and Ischemia Therapies

2012-05-16T21:46:11Z

Application: Post-trauma or stroke utility of oxygen transport compounds to minimize or repair damage to the central nervous system.

Worldwide, stroke is the second leading cause of death, being responsible for 3.3 million of the total 50.5 million deaths each year. Stroke is the No. 3 cause of death in the United States, behind only heart disease (with which it is closely linked) and cancer, and stroke affects more than 700,000 individuals annually in the United States alone. Currently, only 10% of stroke victims recover almost completely, with 25% of victims recovering with minor impairments, 40% of victims experiencing moderate to severe impairments requiring special care, 10% of victims require significant long-term care, and 15% of victims failing to survive the event. Additionally, other ischemia-related issues affect still more people each year, with recent statistics showing critical limb ischemia (as one example) of the type leading to limb amputation increasing by as much as 10% per year. Known treatments such as hyperbaric oxygen, hemoglobin-based blood substitutes, and liquid fluorocarbon-based oxygen carriers have largely failed to compensate in these situations and severe, irreparable damage is still an extremely common result from stroke, ischemia, surgical, and other trauma events.

The present technology provides methods of treatment of critical stroke or ischemia victims with oxygen transport compounds to effectively treat and minimize damage as a result of hypoxic cirses including massive hemorrhage, heart attack, cardiac and vascular surgery, coronary and carotid interventions, and stroke. Further, for example, the disclosed method envisions both therapeutic and preventative uses, affording benefits both for the treatment of stroke events and the prophylactic anticipation of complications from surgery.

Completed in vivo test results have demonstrated clear benefit in decreased tissue damage from stroke not only when administered at the time of the event, but even as much as 3 hours after the onset of the event. As mentioned above, in addition to treating ischemic and hemorrhagic acute strokes, clinical applications might also include pretreatment of high-risk cardiac and carotid surgeries or neurovascular or cardiac interventions providing up to hours of improved tissue oxygenation during iatrogenic ischemic episodes. Many strokes or myocardial infarctions by transient clots, bubbles, or hypoxia may even be completely avoided.

Compositions for Treating Anterior Uveitis and Inducing Experimental Autoimmune Anterior Uveitis

2012-05-16T21:46:26Z

Application: Novel peptides have been developed that are useful to induce Autoimmune Anterior Uveitis (AAU) and to treat symptoms associated with Anterior Uveitis. Additional potential uses for these peptides include identification of specific antigenic or uveitogenic T cells or T regulatory cells for further therapeutic purposes.

Uveitis, or inflammation of the eye, affects at least 600,000 people in the US and Europe alone, and is one of the leading causes of blindness in the United States. Anterior Uveitis accounts for 75% of all cases of Uveitis, and it is estimated that as many at 15 out of every 100,000 people will contract Anterior Uveitis each year.

The present technology comprises immunogenic compositions including novel peptide sequences, and promises multiple potential utilities.

As a research tool, the compositions have been proven in vivo to induce AAU with selectable levels of severity. Thus, they provide an excellent tool for promoting study of the immunopathogenesis of uveitis and identifying and studying autoantigens related thereto.

As a therapeutic, version of these compositions may be used for treatment or prophylaxis of Anterior Uveitis to reduce or eliminate symptoms and thereby potentially prevent irreparable blindness.

Multiple Stationary Phase Matrix and Uses Thereof To Resolve Mixtures of Chiral Molecules

2012-05-16T21:57:08Z

Application: Separation matrices that are used in combination to separate molecules on the basis of chirality and general physio-chemical properties of the molecule of interest.

Separation techniques are widely used in the biological, chemical, and pharmaceutical industries to selectively isolate different compounds. Most separation technologies rely on one type of interaction between a molecule of interest and a stationary phase comprising a functional modality, allowing interaction between the molecule of interest and the stationary phase via hydrophobic, aromatic, hydrophilic, cationic, anionic, or stereochemical interactions. However, many important molecules, and particularly the active pharmaceutical ingredient in pharmaceuticals (e.g., Lipitor, Zocor, Plavix, and Nexium) must be separated from their less-desired, ineffective, or hazardous enantiomers. Typically, adequate resolution of the two enantiomers of a chiral compound is only achieved through the use of other types of separation technologies in combination with a chiral based separation technology. As such, the separation and isolation of a single anantiomer is often a highly expensive and time-consuming undertaking. Therefore, there is a need for a single separation technology that can inexpensively and swiftly resolve mixtures of molecules on the basis of more than one type of reaction.

The present technology provides a multiple phase matrix to separate and isolate molecules of interest from complex mixtures for identification and quantitative purposes. The matrix allows resolution of diastereomers of a class of molecules and also separation of different classes of molecules.

Applications range across a broad spectrum of biology, medicine, and industrial applications wherein complex mixtures of achiral and chiral isomers is common. The proposed matrix utilizes the strengths of both achrial and chiral stationary matrices to resolve molecules based on multiple physical properties, thereby making it more effective and thus expanding the utility of the system for different types of mixtures. Through the use of this unique matrix, only a single chromatographic system is required to provide the resolution of molecules, thereby providing a simpler, better recoveries and more efficient method for resolving complex mixtures of molecules.

Low-Cost Motion Tracking System for Clinical and Consumer Use

2012-05-16T21:57:56Z

Motion capture systems are widely used in biomechanics and animation to measure and analyze human movement. However, the gold standard motion capture systems require ample space dedicated to this use, multiple cameras, and highly trained technicians to run the hardware and software. What is needed for more widespread application of movement algorithms for clinical and sports-related analyses of gait, posture and human performance is a low-cost and widely adoptable tool that is 1) easy to set-up and execute, 2) compact in size, thus requiring less physical space, and 3) delivers accurate three-dimensional movement information.