UTMB inventions win commercialization awards
The Daily News - 20 - Apr - 2008
Two inventions created by University of Texas Medical Branch researchers have won $50,000 awards from the Texas Ignition Fund, a new program designed to spur the commercialization of technologies developed at UT System institutions.
One of the inventions, conceived by anesthesiology professor George Kramer, is a new “smart” IV pump to deliver precise amounts of fluids to trauma and burn victims.
The device is lighter and less expensive than current IV pumps. In combination with newly developed patient-monitoring and computerized autonomous care systems, it has the potential to extend the sort of expert fluid therapy normally found only in hospitals to emergency medical services, combat trauma care and disasters involving large numbers of casualties.
The other award winner, a collaboration between technician Edward Kraft, instructor Stephen L. Hoskins and Dr. Perenlei Enkhbaatar, also members of the anesthesiology department, is a new technology meant to dramatically improve the delivery of inhaled drugs, such as those found in asthma inhalers. See complete article.
UTPB breaks ground on complex
Midland Reporter-Telegram - 18 -Apr - 2008
The past and the present came together at the University of Texas of the Permian Basin Thursday morning when the university broke ground on its Science and Technology Complex. Guests included former University President Duane Leach, Rep. Buddy West and founding faculty member Doug Hale. The 70,000 square-foot-facility will include additional classrooms, labs, faculty offices and student study areas for chemistry, physics, biology, computer science and information resources. Guest speaker West gave credit to former Rep. Ace Pickens for his ability to envision a university that would have great impact on West Texas. "It took a lot of foresight from those who came before us to build this university," West said. See complete article.
Brains behind new bones
Houston Chronicle - 18-Apr - 2008
Rice University and UT-Houston get a $2 million grant to regrow maimed muscle and marrow and 'make our soldiers whole again'
Two Houston institutions will step up their work growing bone tissue for facial injuries as part of a mammoth national effort to bring regenerative medicine breakthroughs to wounded soldiers. The $250 million initiative, the biggest to date involving the young science, is a response to the high number of traumatic injuries being suffered in Iraq and Afghanistan. The numbers reflect battlefield medicine advances that have yielded unprecedented survival rates but also have left many soldiers disabled. "The (initiative) will work to develop techniques that help to make our soldiers whole again," Army Surgeon General Eric Schoomaker said at its announcement at the Pentagon on Thursday. "(It) will use the soldiers' own stem cells to repair nerve damage, regrow muscles and tendons, repair bone wounds, help them heal without scarring ... and help in the cranial reconstruction of severe head injuries." See complete article.
New Calculator Factors Chances for Very Premature Infants
New York Times - 17 - Apr - 2008
Researchers are reporting that they have developed a new way to help doctors and parents make some of the most agonizing decisions in medicine, about how much treatment to give tiny, extremely premature infants. These are infants at the edge of viability, weighing less than 2.2 pounds and born after 22 to 25 weeks of pregnancy, far ahead of the normal 40 weeks. About 40,000 babies a year are born at this very early stage in the United States. The new method uses an online calculator developed for such cases factoring in traits like birth weight and sex and generating statistics on chances of the baby’s survival and the likelihood of disabilities See complete article.
Saliva Can Help Diagnose Heart Attack, Study Shows
ScienceDaily - 17-Apr -2008 Early diagnosis of a heart attack may now be possible using only a few drops of saliva and a new nano-bio-chip, a multi-institutional team led by researchers at The University of Texas at Austin reported at a recent meeting of the American Association for Dental Research.
The nano-bio-chip assay could some day be used to analyze a patient's saliva on board an ambulance, at the dentist's office or at a neighborhood drugstore, helping save lives and prevent damage from cardiac disease. The device is the size of a credit card and can produce results in as little as 15 minutes. See complete article.
University opens manufacturing research center
McAllen Monitor - 10-Apr-2008
Officials at the University of Texas-Pan American and South Texas College hope to usher in a new economic age in the Rio Grande Valley. This morning U.S. Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez and local business and education leaders plan to open the first phase of the much-anticipated Rapid Response Manufacturing Center at UTPA. The center is the first part of a combined project between businesses and local educational institutions, including UTPA and STC, to transform the Valley's manufacturing industry into a global powerhouse. See complete article.
Researchers receive $7 million for obesity programs
Valley Morning Star - 9 - Apr - 2008
A group of Rio Grande Valley researchers has received a $7 million grant to create programs designed to curb the region's obesity and diabetes epidemic.
Researchers at The University of Texas School of Public Health's Brownsville regional campus were awarded a five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health's National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities, officials have announced.
The school is using these funds to establish The Center of Excellence on Diabetes in Americans of Mexican Descent, which will be devoted to developing prevention programs for diabetes and obesity in Mexican Americans, according to officials. The center is part of the existing Hispanic Health Research Center. See complete article.
Xitronix Selected as Texas Emerging Technology Fund Recipient
Austin dBusiness News - 4 Apr 2008
The Austin Chamber of Commerce and the Central Texas Regional Center of Innovation and Commercialization (CenTex RCIC) announce that the state of Texas has chosen Xitronix Corporation, a Central Texas semiconductor company, as a recipient of an award funded through the Texas Emerging Technology Fund (ETF). Austin-based Xitronix, a company specializing in providing breakthrough process control metrology equipment to semiconductor manufacturers, will receive a $500,000 project grant to match raised funds and accelerate the commercialization of its innovative technology development. See complete article.
