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The latest news briefs about our startups and us appearing on our website for the week ending 11/23/2020:

This week's headlines:
This week's briefs:

Slice Teams Up With Bondtech to Launch the DDX for Creality 3D Printers

UF Innovate | The Hub resident client Slice Engineering, a design and engineering company focused on developing cutting edge technologies for the additive manufacturing (3D printing) industry, and Bondtech, a 3D printing company based in Sweden, recently announced the full launch of the “Bondtech DDX Direct Drive eXtruder for Creality” ecosystem.

The expanded DDX ecosystem includes a redesigned version of the Bondtech DDX for Creality; two new Copperhead™ Bimetallic Heat Breaks™ for multiple Creality models born from a co-development effort between the two companies; a new 300°C thermistor from Slice Engineering; and a custom Marlin version by Bondtech to support top end DDX users.

Learn more about Slice Teams Up With Bondtech to Launch the DDX for Creality 3D Printers.
Related news Bondtech and Slice Engineering Join Forces to Create and Launch an Extended Range of Print-Head Solutions for the Desktop and Industrial 3D Printing Space.

The post Slice Teams Up With Bondtech to Launch the DDX for Creality 3D Printers appeared first on UF Innovate.




Morphogenesis CEO Patricia Lawman Recognized As Health Care Innovator 2020 on Tampa Bay Business Journal

The Tampa Bay Business Journal recognized Patricia Lawman, founder and chief executive officer of UF startup and UF Innovate | Sid Martin Biotech graduate company  Morphogenesis, Inc., a clinical-stage immunotherapy company headquartered in Tampa, for being part of the region’s top health care innovators. The feature was part of the Florida Business Journal’s statewide Future of Health Care special publication published October 23, 2020.

“On a personal level, the most important lesson I’ve learned to date is to pick the people you associate with very wisely — that applies across the board from team members, to consultants, to vendors, to board members,” Lawman said during the interview. “Honesty and integrity trump ‘smart talk’ and egos every time. Scientifically, I’ve learned that simple solutions, although they may not sound as impressive as complicated and expensive approaches, usually work out better. Our cancer immunomodulators couldn’t be more simple in concept or wide in applicability. Now we just need to see how far we can take it in treating the plethora of human cancers. We have some very innovative ideas on how to make these products treat different cancers and even different stages of these various cancers.”

Learn more about Morphogenesis CEO Patricia Lawman Recognized As Health Care Innovator 2020 on Tampa Bay Business Journal. – Article behind a paywall.

The post Morphogenesis CEO Patricia Lawman Recognized As Health Care Innovator 2020 on Tampa Bay Business Journal appeared first on UF Innovate.




Oragenics CEO Alan Joslyn Recognized As Health Care Innovator 2020 on Tampa Bay Business Journal

The Tampa Bay Business Journal recognized Alan Joslyn, president and chief executive officer of UF startup and UF Innovate | Sid Martin Biotech graduate company Oragenics, Inc., a leader in the development of new antibiotics against infectious diseases and effective treatments for oral mucositis, for being part of the region’s top health care innovators. The feature was part of the Florida Business Journal’s statewide Future of Health Care special publication published October 23, 2020.

“It’s really important from the current pandemic to develop an effective vaccine to not only control Covid-19, but other viruses down the line. We’ve had other coronaviruses before — SARS and MERS,” Joslyn said during the interview. “Scientists are finding the frequency of these pandemics are increasing. We need to be better prepared and have broader immunity. For years, companies didn’t research new antibiotics classes because of the costs, but it can help create immunity. It’s important to have government support to develop these new antibiotics.”

Learn more about Oragenics CEO Alan Joslyn Recognized As Health Care Innovator 2020 on Tampa Bay Business Journal. – Article behind a paywall.

The post Oragenics CEO Alan Joslyn Recognized As Health Care Innovator 2020 on Tampa Bay Business Journal appeared first on UF Innovate.




Arranta Bio Named Honoree in GrowFL Companies to Watch

Arranta Bio is pleased to be among the top 50 second-stage companies in Florida selected as honorees in the 2020 GrowFL Florida Companies to Watch, a statewide competition that identifies companies expected to see significant growth over the next several years. The 2020 GrowFL Florida Companies to Watch awards celebration is brought to you by Nperspective CFO & Strategic Services, in association with the Edward Lowe Foundation.

Arranta Bio, a world-class CDMO supporting pioneers in the microbiome-based clinical space, was one of 82 finalists announced in September 2020; Fifty honorees were selected after a final round of judging by a panel of independent judges comprised of past honorees, economic development leaders and corporate partners of GrowFL. Companies were judged on a number of criteria including growth in the number of employees; the impact of the business in the job market; increase in sales and/or unit volume; current and past financial reports; innovativeness of the product or service; response to adversity; and contributions to aid community-oriented projects.

Arranta Bio acquired UF Innovate | The Hub resident client Captozyme, now Oxidien Pharmaceuticals, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing a best-in-class enzyme therapeutic for secondary hyperoxaluria.

Learn more about Arranta Bio Named Honoree in GrowFL Companies to Watch.

The post Arranta Bio Named Honoree in GrowFL Companies to Watch appeared first on UF Innovate.




Decision-Support Tool Using HiperGator May Help Manage Devastating Avocado Disease

UF/IFAS researchers are working on a decision-support app to help policymakers and growers decide the best regional treatment options for laurel wilt disease, which is challenging Florida’s $35 million-a-year avocado crop.

Laurel wilt disease is spread by several ambrosia beetle vectors. People, whether they grow avocados or not, can spread the beetles when they move infested wood products – for example, firewood and wood-turner wood — UF/IFAS researchers say. UF/IFAS researchers are trying to get all this spreading under control.

To help develop the app, scientists are using the HiPerGator, a supercomputer on the main University of Florida campus in Gainesville, to analyze massive amounts of data. 

“In the next steps for the project, we plan to integrate satellite image analysis and disease recognition to support decision makers considering the best management strategies,” said Karen Garrett, a UF/IFAS professor. “The computational demands of the machine-learning tools in this project will benefit from the new HiPerGator resources.”

Learn more about Decision-Support Tool Using HiperGator May Help Manage Devastating Avocado Disease.

The post Decision-Support Tool Using HiperGator May Help Manage Devastating Avocado Disease appeared first on UF Innovate.




Blood Biomarkers for Detecting Brain Injury in COVID-19 Patients

COVID-19 can directly cause neurologic symptoms and long-term neurological disease. Elevations of blood biomarkers indicative of brain injury have been reported in the blood and cerebrospinal fluid of COVID-19 patients. Clinical application of blood biomarkers to improve medical management of COVID-19 patients is reported in the peer-reviewed Journal of Neurotrauma.

“The COVID-19 pandemic poses significant risks for acute and persistent neurological deficits, as well as possible increased risk for neurodegenerative diseases,” state Ronald Hayes, Ph.D., founder and chief scientific officer of UF startup and UF Innovate | Sid Martin Biotech alum Banyan Biomarkers, and coauthors. “The use of blood biomarkers of brain injury integrated with additional existing diagnostic tools with big dataset analytics could provide timely, cost-effective approaches to address this increasingly urgent unmet medical need.”

Learn more about Blood Biomarkers for Detecting Brain Injury in COVID-19 Patients.

The post Blood Biomarkers for Detecting Brain Injury in COVID-19 Patients appeared first on UF Innovate.




Patricia Lawman Develops Novel Cell and Gene Therapies to Fight Cancer

Patricia Lawman is on a mission to change the future of cancer care. After losing her parents to lung cancer and lymphoma, respectively, she recognized the detrimental impact of radiation and chemotherapy. She knew there must be a way to treat a patient’s cancer without the risk of toxicity and other negative side effects.

After decades of work in molecular biology, Lawman, CEO and co-founder of the Tampa-based clinical-stage company Morphogenesis, Inc., a UF startup and UF Innovate | Sid Martin Biotech alum, has engineered a treatment harnessing the power of the immune system to recognize and fight cancers. Lawman’s therapy, ImmuneFx, is an immunomodulator that is injected directly into a tumor, activating the immune system to target and destroy tumor cells.

“The immune system is quite capable of killing cancer cells — it’s just hard to distinguish cancer cells from normal cells,” she says. “We take a single bacterial gene and put it in the tumor cells. That gene is expressed on the surface of the tumor cells, like a big red flag that the immune system cannot ignore.”

Learn more about Patricia Lawman Develops Novel Cell and Gene Therapies to Fight Cancer.

The post Patricia Lawman Develops Novel Cell and Gene Therapies to Fight Cancer appeared first on UF Innovate.




Inspired by Photosynthesis, David Wei Creates Cost-Effective and Sustainable Industrial Chemicals

By using solar energy, the technology could have a huge economic impact

At first glance, it might seem a bit farfetched for a chemist specializing in metallic and semiconductor nanomaterials to cite nature as his primary source of inspiration. But to discover the next big innovation in clean energy, David Wei, an associate professor in the University of Florida Department of Chemistry, turned to plants – arguably the best examples of nanotech done right.

When you close your eyes and picture “nanotechnology,” you might not immediately visualize green leaves (maybe, more likely, the inexplicably tiny circuit board in your cellphone).

But, really, all life is driven by molecular machines. It’s no secret that plants use photosynthesis to convert carbon dioxide, water, and sunlight into useable chemical energy in the form of sugar. It was by studying a few key components of that multi-step reaction that Wei realized the potential of simulating these natural chemical reactions in the lab – and not just to make sugar.

Nature-inspired invention

“If we break it down, there are two major steps: the first step is oxidizing water,” explained Wei, a recipient of a UF Innovate’s Invention of the Year award, an honor highlighted at Standing InnOvation 2020.

Wei and his team have developed a technology that mimics this water oxidation step and are using it to produce important chemicals such as carbon monoxide and methane. Even though these chemicals might have a bad rap, they are actually critical feedstocks in the processes to create many of our everyday materials, such as plastics and natural gas.

However, there’s one big difference: Wei’s technology does not rely on fossil fuels, so it has the potential to be more cost-effective and sustainable.

“If we can convert CO2, we deal with global warming; we deal with this climate change,” Wei said. “At the same time, we use the sunlight, the solar energy, which is basically free, to convert the things we don’t want, CO2, into the things we need for our daily lives.”

Dr. David Wei received innovation of the year recognition during Standing InnOvation 2020

Wei went on to explain that CO2 conversion is only one application of this exciting technology. His invention is based on producing protons, which also plays a critical role in nitrogen fixation, a process where inorganic nitrogen is converted into a usable form for plants known as ammonium.

Ammonium is an essential fertilizer component to support commercial agriculture and Wei is confident that his technology can make ammonium more efficiently than we do today.

“There are already tons of patents on this. For example, nitrogen fixation is possibly already 100 years old – a very well-developed industry process,” Wei said, “but it’s limitation is that is very energy consuming.”

Wei went on: “We have demonstrated that nitrogen fixation works, but then the question is: How much does it produce? How efficient is it? If you only have like 0.1 percent in yield, it’s basically not applicable.”

Efficient Photocalysts for Water Oxidation

The main industrial nitrogen fixation method, called the Haber-Bosch process, requires high-pressure and heat to combine nitrogen and hydrogen – conditions that are energetically inefficient and costly. Wei’s technology has the potential to revolutionize nitrogen fixation using moderate solar energy instead. 

“This invention covers the novel catalyst that will oxidize water under very mild solar conditions,” said Lenny Terry, licensing manager at UF Innovate | Tech Licensing. “In addition to oxidizing water, and in tandem with other catalysts, the technology has the possibility to lower the cost of some very important industrial processes. It could have a huge economic impact.”

Wei has worked with Terry and UF Innovate | Tech Licensing during the decade he has been at UF. He praised Tech Licensing’s multi-disciplinary team and encouraged other inventors to work with the office that he finds genuinely excited about his work.

“You always need to think about the broader impact our science, our discovery, our innovations can have,” Wei reflected. “CO2 reduction, nitrogen fixation – this can have an impact on billions of people. When you think about the impact, wow, that’s the strongest motivation for scientists.”


Written by Jenelle Patterson, a marketing volunteer at UF Innovate | Tech Licensing. Jenelle is a postdoctoral candidate in UF’s horticultural sciences department.

The post Inspired by Photosynthesis, David Wei Creates Cost-Effective and Sustainable Industrial Chemicals appeared first on UF Innovate.






 

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