A handful of promising university research projects may be made into a reality, thanks to a multimillion-dollar federal grant that will help transition scientific undertakings into usable technologies.
The $5.1 million award, administered by a partnership with university groups and the U.S. Army, will help fund 11 projects long overlooked by scientific departments, such as a device that picks up sound localization inspired by a fly’s ear and a bacterium that produces biofuels from garbage.
According to Brian Darmody, the associate vice president for research and economic development at the university’s Division of Research, this grant will help transform projects into usable products or technologies — typically one of the most difficult steps in advancing research.
“While there may be something interesting, additional work has to be done to take the technology and show that it has commercial viability,” Darmody said about research that doesn’t make it to the commercial stage. “This is trying to get these technologies off the shelf and move these along to development.”
The Department of Defense granted the award to this university and the University of Maryland, Baltimore in 2009 through the Maryland Proof of Concept Alliance — one of the first programs to attempt to commercialize promising university-based research — according to Jacques Gansler, a university professor and director of the public policy school’s Center for Public Policy and Private Enterprise.
Gansler said the center worked with the Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute and the Army Research Lab to determine what research projects within the University System of Maryland should receive a piece of the multimillion-dollar pie. Once chosen, the individual projects are partnered with small local business firms to further develop the research into usable products.
“The idea behind this is to help commercialize university research more rapidly,” Gansler said. “It’s not just research for research; it’s research for commercialization.”
Martha Connolly, director of MTECH’s Maryland Industrial Partnerships, said projected proposals were rated on a one to 10 scale based on criteria such as the market for specific products and the research’s likelihood of being commercialized before the results were sent to Gansler, who made the final project approvals.
“This is a critical resource for University of Maryland technologies to get to the marketplace,” Connolly said. “We believe that the winners of this award will have a great chance of commercializing a product that will reflect well on the university.”
Darmody said although the research projects are being funded to create technologies to benefit the Army, the collaboration between local businesses and the selected research projects is key to developing the research and turning it into a service usable beyond the Defense Department.
“No private sector company is going to invest money into that patent or paper unless there’s some additional work done that proves this technology works,” he said.
The rest of the funding, which is being administered over a two-year period, will be given to a new string of research projects in the next year, Gansler said. He noted the program could be expanded if it’s successful, which would advance the university’s position as a flagship research institution.
“It’s one more step in the national and probably international recognition of the fact that this is a world-class research institution,” Gansler said. “Recognition of this as a pilot program here at this university is a clear step forward for the university.”
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