Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the leading cause of bronchiolitis, viral pneumonia, and viral death in infants both in the U.S. and worldwide. Almost all children will have been infected with RSV by their second birthday. And yet, this killer of 200,000 infants annually was not the focus of as much laboratory research as might be expected. Martin Moore, PhD, an assistant professor in Emory’s infectious disease unit has developed two model systems. The first is a mouse model of RSV pathogenesis that replicates some features of RSV bronchiolitis, including the proliferation of mucus in the airways. The second model is an efficient RSV reverse genetics system, to study RSV molecular biology and develop novel live attenuated RSV vaccine candidates. Moore has gone beyond basic research, however, to a creative type of lab entrepreneurism, inventing and distributing the tools needed to study RSV. “We have a culture of invention in the lab,” he says. “Everyone in the lab is involved in technology development. We talk about tech transfer every week, it’s central to the lab, and I actually think it creates optimism and excitement for trainees in a time of prevailing pessimism due to funding.” These materials—largely research reagents and
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Dermatology Tools Utilizing Quality of Life Instruments
Dermatologic conditions can be embarrassing and stressful for those affected. Skin diseases can affect the way people see themselves, as well as how they project themselves in society. Emory dermatologist, Suephy Chen, MD, associate professor in dermatology, has developed three instruments that measure how a patient’s quality of life is affected by particular skin diseases. The three instruments, ItchyQoL™, RosaQoL™, and Scalpdex™, are surveys that assess how chronic itch, rosacea, and scalp psoriasis and seborrhoeic dermatitis, respectively, impact a patient’s quality of life. Rosacea and psoriasis are both chronic skin diseases. Rosacea typically involves recurring redness on the cheeks, nose, chin, or forehead. Psoriasis occurs when the immune system sends out faulty signals that speed up the growth cycle of skin cells typically causing raised, red patches on the skin that are covered with a silvery white buildup of dead skin cells. While there are treatments to control and reverse symptoms for rosacea and psoriasis, there are no cures. The symptoms that accompany these ongoing conditions can impact a patient’s day-to-day activities, affecting a patient’s quality of life, or QoL. Chen says instruments that measure QoL are important in treating a disease. Health services research investigates how patients are impacted
Continue readingSeptember is Research Tools Month Again!
For the 3rd year in row, OTT is using September to promote our research tools by highlighting these innovations in our blog, on our website, and on social media. This year introduces a new twist with several of our colleagues in other university technology transfer offices joining us. On Twitter, look for the hashtag #researchtool to follow this month’s campaign. Each year hundreds of new innovations are disclosed by the faculty here at Emory. It is our role to manage these innovations, guiding them from the lab bench to the hands of a commercial partner. An often overlooked piece of the commercialization puzzle is the numerous research tools (cell lines, antibodies, plasmids, research software, etc.) that are also created and shared with many groups and other researchers. We receive more than 20 new research tool disclosures annually and currently have more than 170 tools available for licensing; over a third of those are antibodies. These tools form the workhorses of bench research and are critical components in facilitating discovery. Additionally, they can serve as an additional financial resource for both the University and the scientist in support of the research enterprise. The University has averaged $500,000 in revenue from research
Continue readingIt’s all BIO All Week!
Emory OTT will be at the BIO International Convention, the largest conference for the biotech industry, in San Diego, CA this week. Three members from our office, Executive Director Todd Sherer and Lisa Matragrano and Cliff Michaels from the licensing team, will be there. It looks to be a busy and productive week! Our booth will be within the Georgia Pavilion again this year. Someone from the team will be there each day and we look forward to visiting with old friends and making new ones. If you want an easy way to find us, click here and use BIO’s handy interactive map. The team has more than 25 partnering meetings set-up prior to flying west. We expect to have many great conversations about Emory research, technology, and start-ups. This week’s blog will be a bit different – each morning our blog will be updated with highlights and points of interest from the BIO meeting the previous day. We will also be tweeting up a storm too (@EmoryOTT), starting conversations & joining in on others. We hope you tune in each day to see what’s new! Monday’s takeaways A nod to the past, while looking to the future – amazing
Continue readingHow to Leverage Emory OTT to Build Your Product Pipeline
At any given time Emory has approximately 500 technologies available to license. However whether a startup or an established company, finding new technologies available at a university is time-consuming and sometimes frustrating. We often are asked about the best ways to learn about our technologies available for licensing. There are a number of easy ways to find and remain up-to-date with all the technologies coming out of Emory University. Use our Search option in the Technology Listings page to find non-confidential summaries of the technologies available. It’s run by Google and provides an improved searching experience and more accurate results. Looking for anything around a specific indication or topic? On the same Technology Listings page, click on Keywords in our word cloud and Technology Categories to get a list of those technologies. Subscribe to our RSS feed and follow us on Twitter @EmoryOTT to see all our new technologies as soon as they are listed on the website. Visit our Featured Innovations page and Breakfast Club presentations (as videos and slides) to get even more information about a select collection of technologies available. Contact our knowledgeable Marketing Manager and request a hand-picked selection of technologies related to your needs and
Continue readingRallying Around Medtech: SEMDA’s Eighth Annual Conference Highlights the Role of Tech Transfer
The Southeast Medical Device Association (SEMDA) held their annual conference earlier this month. The conference was filled with thought-provoking seminars, fledgling company presentations, cutting-edge innovations, and great conversations. A highlight for us was the impressive showing of technology transfer professionals from throughout the southeast, an example of the increasing role technology transfer plays in the development of our regional industries. Emory OTT participated as an exhibitor; our booth provided a place for our team to interface with companies, entrepreneurs, and investors alike. In addition, during the first day of the seminar, there was a university technology panel with tech transfer professionals from University of Florida, Vanderbilt, Clemson, University of Alabama at Birmingham, and Emory. Our office’s Director Todd Sherer participated on the panel. The panel discussed hot topics such as training, support of inventors and entrepreneurs, and venture funding of medical device companies. It was no surprise to us, but perhaps a surprise to some in the audience, that the ultimate goal of tech transfer is not necessarily to make money. Although finances are of course a concern, our overarching goal is to promote the utilization of new innovations and get them into the marketplace while simultaneously supporting technologies and
Continue readingPutting a Face on an Emory Tech Transfer Success Story
For those who don’t know, our office is very active in AUTM (Association of University Technology Managers), the leading organization for technology transfer professionals. In an effort to enhance public awareness of the benefits of technology transfer, this past fall AUTM started the “Put A Face On It” project. Casting a wide net, AUTM offered seed funding to universities for the creation of videos that featured the people who have benefited from university-developed innovations. Their goal is to emphasize the real-world impact and real-world connections between technology transfer professionals, their work, and its ability to transform people’s lives. Here at OTT we have the same goal of sharing stories about the impact our innovations and discoveries can have and how our technologies help people around us, even our very own inventors. We are proud to unveil here our first “Put a Face On It” video. It focuses on the Emory Cardiac Toolbox and how it helped Dr. Ernest Garcia. Keep your eyes peeled for the twist! View this new video here. Find additional success stories on our website here. To view other AUTM “Put A Face On It” vidoes look here.
Continue readingIn Focus: March is Neuroscience Month @ OTT
Did you know? More than 400 faculty members from over two dozen departments and centers across Emory University are working today in basic or clinical neuroscience! From our world-class faculty and cutting edge clinicians to advanced facilities and robust resources, Emory University is known for its strengths in the field of neuroscience. Neuroscience is such a key area for the university that supporting and growing neuroscience research actually forms its own integral part of Emory’s overall strategic plan. With this in mind, OTT will be highlighting Emory’s strength in the field throughout March here in our blog, on our website, and on social media. Be on the lookout for exciting new technologies, success stories, and other content that shine a spotlight on Emory’s role in the study of the brain and nervous system. For more information on the many aspects of Emory’s neuroscience programs, please click here: http://neurosciences.emory.edu/about/components.cfm
Continue readingWrapping up Emory’s Experience at AUTM’s 2014 Annual Meeting
We just flew in from the West coast, and boy are our brains tired! It’s a play on an old joke we know, but after the whirlwind of non-stop education, networking, and partnering at AUTM’s (the Association of University Technology Managers) Annual meeting in San Francisco, it pretty accurately describes our energy level. AUTM 2014 was a busy meeting for the OTT team as members volunteered, attended sessions, spoke, and participated in partnering sessions over the four day event. While recapping the entire experience is too much for a blog post, here is a rundown of the highlights and takeaways. Partnering: For the third year in a row, OTT made extensive use of the corporate partnering sessions offered by AUTM. Scheduled beforehand, these 30 minute one-on-one meetings with company representatives gave the OTT team members a chance to discuss particular Emory technologies, gather feedback and learn about each company’s areas of interest. As a whole the team participated in 23 partnering sessions, and the feedback gathered will be used to guide future marketing efforts. Sessions: OTT members had the opportunity to attend many educational sessions during AUTM 2014, covering a range of topics impacting our industry from funding to patent
Continue readingThe Making of a Video Tech Brief: Part 3 War Stories
Creating a technology video is a great way to promote a technology, particularly when “seeing” is more powerful than “reading.” In the previous two posts I discussed general and technical tips for a video project. (In case you missed it, click here & here to read the blog posts!) In the final part of this series, I will share a few “war stories” from my experience. Hopefully you will find these examples helpful when creating your own effective technology video. Anecdote 1: Working with Deceptively Noisy Locations During the planning stages for the Beast Surgery Support System video, I exchanged emails with the tech’s inventors and we agreed to film in an operating room at Emory Hospital. This location seemed like a great idea on paper, but once we began filming I quickly realized that there was a rather loud air-conditioning in the operating room as well as a hollow echo that would interfere with the audio. With nowhere else to go and limited time, we filmed demonstrations of the tech in the operating anyway. While reviewing the footage, I realized most of the audio was entirely unusable because of the background noise and echoes. I wasn’t the only one
Continue readingEmory OTT Attends the Annual JP Morgan Healthcare Conference
Last month from January 13-16, 2014, the JP Morgan 32nd Annual Healthcare Conference was held in San Francisco, California. For many years, Emory’s Office of Technology has attended; represented this year by Executive Director, Todd Sherer and Director, Kevin Lei. With approximately 300 companies presenting and over 4,000 investors present, the conference is one of the largest healthcare investment symposia in the industry. It brings together global industry leaders, emerging companies, innovators, technology transfer offices, and members of the investment community all in one place. “JP Morgan is an important meeting in our strategy to build relationships with the business community and showcase the University’s innovations,” said Sherer. Over the course of four days Sherer and Lei met with over a dozen venture firms to discuss some of Emory’s most exciting opportunities, which were AbbyMed, LLC: a company focused on a class of small molecules aimed at treating certain types of intractable cancers such as brain, liver, and melanoma. The company’s initial clinical target is glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). Accuitis, Inc.: a company focused on dermatological and ophthalmic pharmaceuticals targeting underserved indications. The company’s initial clinical target is rosacea. Cambium Medical Technologies, LLC: a company focused on the development of a
Continue readingThe Making of a Video Tech Brief: Part 2 Technical Tips
Creating a technology video is a great way to promote a technology, particularly when “seeing” is more powerful than “reading.” Last week I discussed general tips for a video project. (In case you missed it, click here to read the blog post!) In part 2 of this series, I will discuss the more technical side of creating video tech briefs. Hopefully you will find these pointers (many learned through personal trial and error!) to be helpful in creating your own effective technology video. Technical Tips This may be completely obvious to many, but before meeting, check the battery levels for all the equipment. Also, be sure there is an SD card in the camera or bag and that it has enough space. Bring spares! If possible, film and photograph the invention by itself. Record extra video of the location, inventors, and invention which can be very useful during post production. During filming, ask that the inventor(s) look at the camera lens, rather than you. Avoid looking directly at them while filming; this causes them to focus on you rather than the lens. The best way to achieve this is to place yourself directly next to the camera at eye level.
Continue readingThe Making of a Video Tech Brief: Part 1 Project Tips
Creating a technology video is a great way to promote a technology, particularly when “seeing” is more powerful than “reading.” In this three part series, I will discuss two sets of tips (general and technical) and lessons learned (many through personal trial and error!) that may be helpful in creating your own effective technology video. Project Tips Prepare 2-3 questions prior to your interview. Don’t forget a question about the tech transfer office and their contribution(s). Often, you will get much more than you need from just a few questions. Keep an eye on how “technical” or jargon-filled the language of the interviewee is – if necessary let them know they are speaking to a broader, more general audience. Be sure they talk about the technology’s benefits over existing technology/practices and about the future potential or development path of the technology. Scheduling can be a challenge as faculty and students are very busy people! Suggest a place where the technology can be used in a more visually interesting location. Conduct the interview in a quiet place where they can sit and speak; this practice will provide the best audio for voiceover as well as video clips for transitions. Don’t forget
Continue readingSocial Media Lessons Learned & Take-Homes for TTOs – Part 2
Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, oh my! So many options, so little time and it appears like everyone else is jumping on the social media train, what is my office to do? We don’t want to be left at the station! On one hand social media can be a powerful tool for building your brand and much can be gained, but on the other hand, if done poorly or without realistic expectations, it can be a great deal of effort with little reward. In this two-part blog post we will share our lessons learned as well as snippets gathered from a recent social media event we attended featuring thought leaders in the social media/marketing fields. (Read part one of the blog series here.) Part 2 Recently we had a chance to attend Entrepreneur Magazine’s “Thought Leaders Live” Event here in Atlanta covering “The Mathematics of Social Media.” This half-day event featured a panel of leaders in the fields of social media and marketing. They discussed how to use social media platforms effectively and how to measure its success, among other relevant topics. While not every point was necessarily applicable to our business as TTOs, we did come away with some
Continue readingSocial Media Lessons Learned & Take-Homes for TTOs – Part 1
Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, oh my! So many options, so little time and it appears like everyone else is jumping on the social media train, what is my office to do? We don’t want to be left at the station! On one hand social media can be a powerful tool for building your brand and much can be gained, but on the other hand, if done poorly or without realistic expectations, it can be a great deal of effort with little reward. In this two-part blog post we will share our lessons learned as well as snippets gathered from a recent social media event we attended featuring thought leaders in the social media/marketing fields. Part 1 Our office jumped into the social media fray in 2010 when we recognized the increasing importance of communicating with our colleagues, customers, and community via online channels. Since that time, the number of users within our industry has grown exponentially; in fact, our friends at Fuentek™ recently conducted a survey of TTOs and found two-thirds of respondents used social media in some capacity.* While much has been written about metrics and strategies for effectively using social media to build your brand, we thought
Continue readingFrom the Director: Emory Breakfast Club
We sat down with Executive Director Todd Sherer to talk about one of OTT’s signature events – the Emory Breakfast Club. Started in 2010, OTT’s Breakfast Club is an early morning networking breakfast during which OTT’s licensing associates briefly pitch new innovations. Also, take a look at our video about the Breakfast Club events. What was the inspiration for creating the event? We realized we needed a better way to engage the business community with regards to licensing opportunities we had in the office. We created this event so that we could find a way to more regularly bring the business community together and pitch technologies to them. What do you feel the audience gets out of the event? I think the audience gets a chance to come and sit down and hear more about Emory and not just what is going on in the Tech Transfer Office. We will occasionally have speakers and provide background information about other things across campus. They get a chance to hear about business opportunities and to network. Since this event is invitation only, how was the invitee list created? We thought a lot about who to invite. We wanted it to be a fairly
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