January 22, 2007
Contact: Jana Smith
405.744.5827
jana.smith@okstate.edu
“Gap Funding” Aids in New Technology Development
Stillwater , Okla . --OSU's Technology Business Assessment Group has selected four faculty research projects with commercial potential to receive “gap funding” for new technology development. TBAG Director Roy Cail, OSU-Okmulgee, announced the awards following the review of a number of outstanding presentations from OSU faculty pursuing research funding.
Cail said, “OSU and TBAG specifically are delighted to support our researchers with funding that can advance this high level of research for those projects that have a high likelihood of being commercialized.”
TBAG identifies research projects that when fully developed have the potential for real-world application, then helps move those projects forward by awarding funds for early stage development. Hopefully, these initial steps lead to a startup company or joint venture with an interested company. TBAG, a joint partnership of OSU-Stillwater and OSU-Okmulgee, was formed in 2005 to engage research faculty developing new technologies in the commercialization process.
TBAG is composed of private sector partners experienced in new product identification and new technology evaluation, including early-stage capital investors, representatives from i2E, the OSU Center for Innovation and Economic Development, the OSU-Okmulgee Economic Development and Training Center, the OSU VP for Research and Technology Transfer and the OSU Assistant VP for Technology Transfer.
The following OSU faculty received TBAG funding for further development of research projects with potential commercial application:
Dr. Glenn Zhang has identified three novel antimicrobial peptides, namely fowlicidins 1-3, which display potent activities against a range of clinically important bacteria, including antibiotic-resistant strains. Fowlicidins hold great promise as novel therapeutic drugs in the treatment of antibiotic-resistant infections and septic shock. As a prelude to commercialize these compounds for human clinical use, Zhang will evaluate the performance of fowlicidins in laboratory animals. The
in-vivo data to be produced will serve as indispensable preclinical results, paving the way for the commercial development of these peptides as therapeutic drugs.
The commercialization of this technology will have an enormous impact on health care. Worldwide, approximately 1400 people a day die from sepsis. Sepsis provides an annual market opportunity of $2-3 billion for a product that truly reduces mortality. Even with a conservative 20-30% sepsis market penetration, these compounds could generate $400-600 million of revenues annually. Commercialization of these compounds in Oklahoma could lead to construction of a multi-million dollar R&D production facility and the creation of a number of high-paying jobs.
Dr. Allen Apblett is developing a new material that uses nanosized particles to remove arsenic and heavy metals from drinking water. The new technology promises to be easy to use, cheaper and more effective than the current alternatives. He has discovered a nanoparticulate material that can remove both common types of arsenic (arsenate and arsenite) found in drinking water while other treatment options are only useful for arsenate. His material also excels at removing toxic heavy metals from water, a property that is lacking in competing technologies.
In this project, Apblett is converting these particles into a form that is more technically and commercially viable for drinking water treatment. This will be accomplished by synthesizing the particles as a component of plastic beads that have the correct size and shape for water treatment. The materials that will be produced will be used to treat water containing arsenic, lead and copper. There are numerous sites throughout the United States and the world where the water supply is contaminated with arsenic and heavy metals and this product will enable the affected people to have safe water to drink.
Dr. Neil Purdie has developed a chemical color reagent that is selective to compounds that contain the very reactive –C=C-CH 2 -molecular group. This is the most significant grouping in plasma cholesterol and plasma omega-3 and omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (lipids) and analysis of the absorbance spectra will permit their exact measurements in situ . The technology has been developed to the point where seven serum lipids can be simultaneously measured in less than 20 minutes making it very accessible and very practical for major clinical studies that typically involve thousands of subjects.
A critical need in the industry is a rapid, convenient routine assay that will substantially decrease the costs for screening patients but more importantly to provide new data for alternative lipid parameters that will enhance the risk prediction models. Purdie will use the “gap funding” to engage a reputable instrument manufacturer under license to design an air- and moisture-free liquid delivery system as an add-on to one of their commercial spectrometer products.
Dr. Robert W. Fulton proposes to develop a modified live virus (MLV) Bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) vaccine for diseases that affect cattle and lead to increased morbidity and mortality. The technology will use a cell culture derived vaccine with a cytopathic (CP) strain of BVDV1b isolated from Oklahoma cattle. The MLV BVDV vaccines with CP strains will be sought by the veterinary biologics companies and veterinarians as they stimulate more rapid immunity with longer duration of immunity compared to killed (inactivated) vaccines.
Fulton will use 16 calves in a study to determine immunogenicity of the BVDV1b vaccine. Six calves will receive the vaccine by the subcutaneous route, 6 calves by the intramuscular route and 4 calves will serve as unvaccinated controls. The calves will be held for 42 days and tested weekly for antibodies to determine if the vaccine induces BVDVlb antibodies.
Without “gap funding” some research projects would never make it to market. TBAG provides the necessary funds to move them through the technology pipeline to commercialization. The incentive for faculty is the development of a technology that may lead to a new startup company or a license agreement with an industrial partner. The result is a win-win situation for both OSU faculty and the university once the technology enters the marketplace as a viable solution to a real-world problem.
For more information about TBAG or the faculty projects mentioned here, please contact Roy Cail, OSU-Okmulgee, 918-293-5130 or Dr. Steve Price, OSU Stillwater, 405-744-8920.
