TECH CONNECT
Turning Ideas into Opportunities
Monthly news & updates


May 3, 2021
FY 2021 STATISTICS YEAR TO DATE
Licenses*/Options
207
MTAs
985
CDAs
53
Invention Disclosures
141
U.S. Patents Issued
62
*includes end-user software and materials licenses along with conventional technology licenses
INCA software, developed by Young Lab, tops 1,000 academic licenses

A software tool for metabolic analysis developed by a Vanderbilt chemical engineer recently passed 1,000 total academic licenses and is the most licensed software on the university’s online licensing and e-commerce platform.

Additionally, it was the third-highest revenue generator on the platform, VU e-Innovations, for 2020. About 20 total commercial licenses have been executed since INCA was released. As of 2020, a total of 125 INCA licenses were executed - the bulk of which were academic.

INCA, or Isotopomer Network Compartmental Analysis, was developed by Jamey Young and released in 2014 as part of the Metabolic Flux Analysis suite. Using INCA enables researchers to model data from metabolic tracer studies and quantify the flow of labeled atoms inside living cells. The information provided by INCA can help to better understand metabolic diseases or improve the productivity of cell-based bioprocesses. 


“We developed it to serve our own research needs,” said Young, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering. “We were investigating the metabolism of tumor cells, how they use nutrients to grow and survive. We needed better software tools to make sense of the data we were collecting in the lab.”
Study shows new COVID target could improve vaccines
Despite an impressive vaccination effort that exceeds 2 million shots a day, rates of COVID-19 are again on the rise in several parts of the United States, as is the spread of highly transmissible variants of the virus.
Current vaccines and monoclonal antibody therapies may be insufficient to bring the pandemic fully under control because they target only one, highly mutable part of the COVID-19 virus, according to researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri.

Treatment and prevention may be more effective if multiple antigenic sites on the virus are targeted, they concluded in a paper published last week in the journal Cell.

“Our team found a new site of vulnerability on the virus spike protein that can be targeted by protective human antibodies. This gives new insights into how our vaccines are working,” said James Crowe Jr., MD, director of the Vanderbilt Vaccine Center.

Crowe, who is Ann Scott Carell Professor in the Departments of Pediatrics and Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology at VUMC, is the paper’s co-corresponding author with Washington University’s Larissa Thackray, PhD, and Michael Diamond, MD, PhD.
Nine Vanderbilt technologies earn patent protection in April
Polycarbonate containing compounds and methods related thereto
Human monoclonal antibodies to Staphylococcus aureus lukab toxin
Transient electronics using thermoresponsive materials
Methods for treating inflammation and hypertension with .gamma.-ketoaldehyde skavengers
Directed assembly of nanoparticles with light and electric field
Methods and systems for predicting response to immunotherapies for treatment of cancer
Monitoring and analysis of nucleic acid hybridization state and amplification using L-DNA
Isoquinoline ether compounds as mGluR4 allosteric potentiators, compositions, and methods of treating neurological dysfunction
Continuum robots with multi-scale motion through equilibrium modulation
Technology Spotlight:

A Simple and Highly Portable Flow Phantom for Doppler Ultrasound Quality Measurements
A new flow phantom has been designed in which Doppler ultrasound measurements can be conducted for quality assurance purposes. The phantom is highly portable and allows for simple and reproducible measurements of Doppler ultrasound function. This combination of advantages allows for realistic monthly, weekly, even daily Doppler QA measurements.

Technology Features:
  • Highly Portable: easy to store and handle
  • Sealed System: No need to add Doppler fluid
  • No power required in order to operate the system
  • Novel design allows for repeatable, consistent, and constant flow
  • Simple operation making frequent Doppler measurements feasible

Intellectual Property Status
  • A patent has been issued (10,085,725)
Opportunities for Industry Partnership:
IN-PART is seeking next generation research projects related to Covid-19. In their second open call (details of the first can be found here), IN-PART is inviting academic researchers and research commercialization community to share with us non-confidential details of any COVID-related research, innovation or technologies.
What research is IN-PART looking for?

The research/technology can be anything directly or indirectly addressing the spread of SARS-CoV-2 & treatment of COVID-19. This includes diagnostics, therapeutics, vaccines, drug delivery and infection prevention. Especially researchers studying long-term COVID, next-generation vaccines and therapeutics, ways to measure and predict long-term immunity, as well as the impacts on society, psychology and the environment, and preparing for the next pandemic.
If you are interested in submitting to IN-PART, please reach out to CTTC@vanderbilt.edu
for more information.
Weekly Interactions
Below is a sampling of the interactions that have taken place in our office and with our staff over the last month.
ATTENDED
  • Attended the final presentations of Robert Webster’s Innovation Realization class at the School of Engineering

  • Attended Inteum user group meeting and discussed developments planned for the Inteum IP management database

  • Attended a call with a major software company regarding intellectual property terms contained in their proposed research agreement with the Vanderbilt University Medical Center

  • Attended a webinar to learn about the changing requirements to patent antibody inventions in the US and Europe

  • Attended an online seminar entitled “Molecules to Market – Overcoming the Valley of Death” hosted by Deerfield Management and the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy

  • Attended a virtual talk on “The Importance of Intellectual Property in Healthcare Innovation during COVID-19” hosted by the Center for Strategic & International Studies

  • Attended The Wond'ry: April Innovation Open Mic pitch event

  • Attended program hosted by the Private Directors’ Association, “Cultivating the Next Generation- Building Your Personal Board of Directors”

  • Attended JP Morgan's Webinar: “When a SPAC makes sense: Perspectives from both sides of the equation”

  • Attended The 12th Annual Nashville Technology Council Awards event

  • Attended Deerfield’s Webinar: “Molecules to Market: Overcoming the Valley of Death”

  • Attended LaunchTN's SBIR Q&A with NSF Program Director Peter Atherton

  • Attended 2021 Nashville Smart Business Dealmakers Conference

  • Attended Alliance Bernstein Webinar: “Nashville Climate Summit"

  • Attended nPhase, Inc. first quarter board of directors meeting

  • Attended GCEC Webinar: “Best Practices for Incubator & Accelerator Programs”

  • Attended iCorps Program (virtual)

  • Attended “The Trajectory of Telehealth Post COVID” Series Webinars
EXECUTED

  • Executed an amendment with HeroWear, a Vanderbilt startup developing assistive devices, in order to add additional technologies to their license agreement for commercialization

  • Executed an NDA with a leading ultrasound company for an ultrasound probe arm developed by Raj Gupta from the Department of Anesthesiology


MARKETED
  • Engaged with a surgical device company to discuss the commercialization of a technology developed by Galen Perdikis in the Department of Plastic Surgery

  • Held discussions with a major medical device manufacturer for potential collaboration around image-guided surgery technologies from the laboratory of Michael Miga in the Department of Biomedical Engineering

  • Facilitated a discussion with a digital animation company for a possible development project to incorporate animation for Play Nicely from the laboratories of Seth Scholer in the Department of Pediatrics

  • Held a call with a large electronic medical record company to continue negotiations on a license for a pediatric survey tool

  • Held a call with a venture-backed company interested learning and in cognitive development, to explore the Memory Monitor software package from the laboratories of Geoffrey Woodman in the Department of Psychology

  • Held introductory discussions with OttoBock SE who have acquired licensing rights for a technology initially licensed to Freedom Innovations of California

  • Held several calls with a major international company with a variety of VUMC clinicians and researchers regarding potential use cases for the company’s technology and areas for future collaboration with Vanderbilt


  • Held a call with the Association of University Technology Managers regarding the potential expansion and enhancement of their TransACT database of university licensing transactions

  • Facilitated introductory meeting between AbSeek Bio and investor, Emerson Collective

  • Marketed several Vanderbilt technologies to a Chicago-area health tech incubator


  • Facilitated introductory meeting between AbSeek Bio and potential investor, Upfront Ventures



  • Held call with the VUMC Accelerating Drug Discovery & Repurposing Incubator team and a pharmaceutical company interested in drug repurposing

  • Held call with a VC/incubator interested in the therapeutic programs being developed at Vanderbilt and the Medical Center
PARTICIPATED
  • Served as a judge for the ASPIRE Business Module to review proposals from grad students and post-docs related to optimizing the business practices of several internal centers and cores

  • Participated in a Focus Group for the Association of University Technology Managers as part of their Strategic Planning efforts


  • Presented at MIDP Lunch Forum on "What is Marketing and Why is it Important"
Technology Pipelines

The pipeline highlights a listing of fully human antibodies by target disease, availability by field, and stage of development. Links to scientific publications are also included.
View our updated Medical Device Pipeline.

The catalogue highlights medical device technologies currently in the pipeline for commercialization at Vanderbilt University. This Pipeline has more than 100 technologies in 12 categories from 40 research groups.

The catalog has more than 60 small molecule therapeutics, 35 biologics and 7 biomarkers that are currently in Vanderbilt's pipeline.