Purdue scientists earn grants to ready research for market
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Four medical and agbioscience researchers at Purdue University are receiving extra funding for their projects thanks to a grant from the Trask Innovation Fund.
In total, the Trask fund is giving $175,000 to the four separate projects. The funds are managed by the Purdue Innovates Incubator, and funds manager Matt Dressler said they’re meant to support scientists in the time between their product launching and when it becomes widely adapted by the marketplace.
“These challenges include a technology becoming obsolete or an inventor feeling dispirited because of a lack of progress,” Dressler said in a news release. “Trask funding can address those challenges as Purdue faculty develop a discovery into a viable marketplace product. The fund complements several other Purdue Innovates resources provided to university inventors and entrepreneurs.”
The projects getting grant money are:
Senay Simsek: $50,000 for developing superabsorbent material from hemp
Simsek is the head of the food science department at Purdue and her research team used cellulose extracted from hemp and refined it into a material that’s more absorbent than other previously existing materials. She said she plans to use the funding to scale up production of her product.
Yoon Yeo: $50,000 for IMAX, or immunoactive complexes
Yeo is studying the adoptive immune system and is developing a solution that would help the body trigger a stronger natural defense to tumors. She said the funding will help fund further trials and studies that will lead to more grant money.
Jesse Chi Zang: $30,000 for “precision opto-control” system to manipulate chemical processes in cells
Zang and his team are developing a laser-based system that can help control various chemical processes within cells. The system would be useful to biologist researchers who could use it to more efficiently test medications or other processes in cells.
Andrea Kasinski: $45,920 for targeted cancer treatment in non-small cell lung cancer
Kasinski is the deputy director for the Purdue Institute for Cancer Research. Her innovation is a treatment for targeting multiple cancer-causing genes in one agent. She says the grant money will be used for more tests that will make investors more confident.
Trask is seeking applications for its next round of funding. Those applications are due at the end of September.