“Creating a Sustainable Network for Bioengineering
Innovation and Translational Research”
University of Virginia
Department of Biomedical Engineering
PI: Thomas C. Skalak
Co PIs: James Aylor, William Walker, Arthur Garson
NSF Award #IIP-0650253
3 Year Award
Start Date: 15 March 2007
Key Attributes of our
Innovation Ecosystem:
Brief Project Overview:
Our project is enhancing innovation in bioengineering by
creating a sustainable global network of university and
corporate partners for the experiential education of new talent
for the bioengineering workforce and improved translation of
new bioengineering knowledge to products and services. The
two major themes are "upstream innovation" and "globally
distributed design." Upstream innovation is the concept that
parallel, early interaction between business, scientific,
engineering, legal, and marketing components can positively
impact the level of innovation. Upstream innovation is being
implemented by the creation of integrated Capstone Design
teams, student internships at companies of varying size and
maturity. Our global bioengineering network is viewable
online at www.bmeplanet.org
Program Activities:
Questioning & Curiosity:
the global bioengineering network
Powering Web 2.0 solutions that accelerate
bioengineering research, education, innovation.
• How does EU and Asian bioengineering design differ from
U.S. education? The differences define opportunity!
@BMEplanet.org
300
organizations.
44 countries.
6 continents.
•What would motivate companies to post key needs/ &
market –pull concepts?
ideas
open innovation
workspaces
global collaboration
opportunities
Risk Taking:
next-generation workforce
networking
online contact book
messaging
•Invested in web functions before all proof-of-concept
completed
real-time communication
Internships:
5 International internships (2009 and 2010)
126 industrial internships with 52 companies
•International idea exchange, despite I.P barriers
www.BMEplanet.org is a global sustainable
network that helps to facilitate discovery & innovation.
Facilitates new person-to-person links
Accelerates BME education research & innovation
•International corporate internships
•Multi-university design projects
•Capstone incubators for translational knowledge
•Enhanced access to corporate markets
Raises the awareness of the field globally
Increases productivity and improves human health & dignity
•Experiential education of bioengineering talent for the workforce Enhanced
translation of bioengineering knowledge to products & services in the clinic
•Researchers find one another, establish new points of contact & new
collaborations
•Students find internships anywhere around the world, with the intent of getting
better hands-on, immersive experience in their formative training
•Faculty and students to create collaborative project workspaces to foster
innovation
•Faculty and students get their latest ideas/technologies into the mainstream to
enhance translation of research into products and services
Top Contributions/Outcomes:
1. Free, global exchange of data &
knowledge (including ideas, problems,
solutions, etc.) across traditional barriers
(corporate/university, geographic, etc.),
enabling crowd-sourcing and open
innovation
Openness:
•Allowed all partners to join – no filtering
A Better Mouse Model for
Brain Cancer Research.
Freiburg, Germany
Diana Burk spent part of the summer at the
Max Planck Institute in Freiburg, Germany.
She helped test a new mouse model for a
deadly form of brain cancer.
Over 500
individuals
have signed online
since September
2. Broadly publicizing the professional
network
Collaboration Across Fields:
•Devices and biologics
•Arts, economics, architecture, sciences, and engineering
•Process engineering (Six Sigma) vs. “upstream innovation”
Placing Partners in “New
Environments” & “Playgrounds”:
2. New corporate internships for the
experiential education of next-generation
workforce
3. A first-of-its-kind “high net-knowledge
network” that can be easily adapted to
other disciplines
Website went live
Top Challenges:
Sept. 24, 2009
1. Securing agreements with corporations to
post/share challenges or problems for
community-based input
•No preferred sponsor location - site organized by people and
ideas
•Key driver for the “Global Network” concept
•See BMEplanet’s “Idea” spaces to play
Leading/Inspiring of Surprising or
Unexpected Results:
Charlottesville, VA
Winner 2009 poster competition. All
interns in the program prepare a
poster and present it at a symposium
to share their collective results.
•Open innovation allows users to define own goals and
partners
3. Striking a balance between network
content, functionality, and usage
Partners:
•Value proposition follows emerging partners, not pre-defined
We have grown from 27 initial “charter” organizations to over 300
universities, corporations, non-profits, government agencies, and
investment partners in 44 countries on 6 continents
•Rapid social network allows group intelligence to selfassemble, globally
Faster, Cheaper
Tuberculosis
Diagnosis for Clinics
in Africa
Funded by
National Science
Foundation
&
Ewing Marion Kauffman
Foundation
PFI
"Development of a low cost transmissiontype fluorescent microscope for use in
automated tuberculosis diagnostics".
.
The device shown in the picture was the 1st
prototype of the LED- transmission based
microscope. It will eventually be used for
automated diagnosis of TB in poorly
developed countries by examining sputum
samples. Internship in Cape Town, South
Africa
National Science Foundation Partnerships For Innovation
Grantee’s Meeting April 25-27, 2010
Arlington, VA
.
.