In March 2013, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention described emerging antibiotic resistance as a “very serious problem” and a “nightmare.”  At about the same time, government officials in the United Kingdom called antibiotic resistance a “catastrophic threat” and “national security risk as serious as bioterrorism.” They weren’t talking about methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) or drug-resistant tuberculosis (though still pernicious problems), but rather drug-resistant Gram-negative bacteria. 

Dr. Herbert Schweizer, a Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology, is an internationally recognized expert in antibiotic resistance of Gram-negative bacteria, has published widely in this area, and serves as a consultant to pharmaceutical companies. He recently returned from a grant review panel of the European Union Innovative Medicines Initiative in Brussels, Belgium, where he served as the only academic scientist from the United States.

“As U.S. health authorities and the public were pre-occupied with MRSA, the first member of the carbapenem- resistant enterobacteriaceae (CRE) family emerged in the United States and rapidly spread throughout the nation and then worldwide, receiving little fanfare at the time,” said Dr. Schweizer, whose laboratory studies mechanisms of antibiotic resistance and tests novel antibiotic candidates for the pharmaceutical industry.

“Dr Schweizer’s laboratory also provides unique bacterial strains and other tools for drug discovery efforts that are frequently licensed to industry through CSU Ventures,” said Rodman Tompkins, Director, Licensing and Business Development for CSU Ventures, the technology transfer office for Colorado State University, noting the importance of collaborative efforts in advancing drug discovery.

This is the third time Dr. Schweizer’s expertise was sought by the IMI in the evaluation of the “No Drugs for Bad Bugs” program. The European Union is investing 2 billion euros in this private-public partnership aimed at identifying novel ways of discovering and developing new antibiotics to fight emerging antibiotic resistance mostly in Gram-negative bacteria.  Dr. Schweizer noted that similar efforts are needed in the United State where, in 2009, the Infectious Diseases Society of America warned of “bad bugs, no drugs” and of a domestic public health crisis in the making in face of stagnating antibiotic discovery efforts and emergence of antimicrobial resistance, especially with the aptly named ESKAPE pathogens (Enterococcus faecium, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Enterobacter species).

CRE infections have become increasingly resistant to last-resort antibiotics during the past decade, and more hospitalized patients are getting lethal infections that, in some cases, are impossible to cure.  CRE bacteria kill up to half of patients who get bloodstream infections from them. In addition to spreading among patients, often on the hands of health care personnel, CRE bacteria can transfer their resistance to other bacteria within their family. Currently, almost all CRE infections occur in people receiving significant medical care in hospitals, long-term acute care facilities, or nursing homes.

These findings were published in March in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Vital Signs report, and are a call to action for the entire health care community to work urgently – individually, regionally and nationally – to protect patients. During just the first half of 2012, almost 200 hospitals and long-term acute care facilities treated at least one patient infected with these bacteria.   

“CRE are nightmare bacteria.  Our strongest antibiotics don’t work and patients are left with potentially untreatable infections,” said CDC Director Tom Frieden, MD/ MPH.  “Doctors, hospital leaders, and public health, must work together now to implement CDC’s ‘detect and protect’ strategy and stop these infections from spreading.”

In addition to CRE bacteria, researchers are concerned other once-treatable, Gram-negative bacterial infections are becoming antibiotic resistant. In 2011, Dr. Schweizer said, scientists discovered a "superbug" strain of gonorrhea in Japan that is resistant to all recommended antibiotics. Even in North America, the treatment-resistant gonorrhea threat is rising and doctors are now left with only one effective treatment for most cases of gonorrhea.

“These frightening developments could transform a once easily treatable infection into a global public health threat similarly to what is happening with the global emergence of carbapenem-resistant bacteria,” said Dr. Schweizer. “In the United States alone, 300,000 cases of gonorrhea are reported - and up to 600,000 estimated - annually.  CRE infections and gonorrhea are just two examples of a number of emerging Gram-negative superbugs for which treatment options are rapidly disappearing – clearly a brewing public health crisis. In my laboratory, we continue to pursue answers to the development of antibiotic resistance in Gram-negative bacteria and hope that our work will help lead to new, effective treatments against these life-threatening infections.”

“Steve brings an ideal blend of technical and business expertise, along with experience in large and small companies. With Steve on board, we can really accelerate our progress toward commercialization,” said Ken Reardon, CTO and co-founder of OptiEnz Sensors and a Colorado State professor of chemical and biological engineering. “Steve joins the company with extensive leadership experience and vast knowledge of the test and measurement industry.” OptiEnz’s prototype for continuous monitoring is in customer trials in two primary markets: industrial control processes and environmental water monitoring.

OptiEnz Sensors, LLC creates devices that allow users to continuously measure the concentration of organic chemicals in water, and the technology can be used in a wide range of applications such as monitoring for pollutants in a river, detecting contaminants in ground water, optimizing the production of pharmaceuticals, or tracking the level of sugar during fermentation processes. OptiEnz biosensors are placed directly in the stream or reaction vessel, so there is no need for someone to painstakingly remove samples, send them to a laboratory and wait hours or days for results. This allows their customers to get the information they need rapidly so they can optimize their process and quickly take corrective actions.

“OptiEnz is a great company and I’m excited to lead us toward commercialization,” said Witt. “CSU Ventures has been very supportive of the company. They’ve enabled us to put two patents in place and we have six more pending. Being a client company of the Innosphere has also set up a great ecosystem for us. There’s a lot of entrepreneurial energy that comes with being surrounded by other high-caliber startups. Working with the SAGE advisors and getting help from the Innosphere’s access to capital have been especially important for us.”

Witt has worked in several entrepreneurial roles including Vice President of Business Development for Constant Wave, an early stage company in Colorado Springs. Some of Witt’s other positions have included President of Compressor Controls Corporation, a global business which delivers solutions for turbo-machinery control applications in the oil and gas industry, and Vice President and General Manager for Agilent Technologies in Colorado Springs, developing and delivering telecommunication test equipment.

For more information, contact Steve Witt, OptiEnz Sensors CEO at Steve.Witt@OptiEnzSensors.com or 719-200-4722.

Courtesy of Rocky Mountain Innosphere

Melissa Reynolds and her startup company Diazamed have received a 2013 TechConnect National Innovation Award for their research on agents to speed wound healing and the body’s acceptance of biologically implanted materials, such as catheters, stents, or surgical meshes.

“Wounds that do not heal and medical implants that are rejected by the body create huge risks for patients beyond the initial wound and surgical procedure, including infections, cell death, limb loss, cardiovascular conditions, secondary injuries, diseases, and more. It’s imperative to find innovative solutions,” Reynolds says.

Reynolds’ research group is making materials embedded with nitric oxide, a powerful, naturally occurring substance within the body that acts to block infections, prevent clotting and boost healthy cell growth.

Reynolds’ work was vetted and selected for The National Innovation Summit and Showcase sponsored by TechConnect, a global technology outreach and development organization. TechConnect says it organized the event for industry, university, government and media representatives “in support of the White House and Congressional call for innovation commercialization initiatives.”

Top tier research
According to Steve Foster, CSU Ventures director of licensing and business development, “only 20 percent of 500 submissions were accepted to present, which means that Reynolds’ technology placed in the top tier of all submitted technologies as ranked by the TechConnect Corporate and Investment Partner Committee.” Foster is accepting the award and presenting Reynolds’ work at the summit and showcase.

Reynolds’ research team and company are making biomaterials in the form of biodegradable polymers and nitric oxide-based, metal-organic frameworks, or MOFs.

“We focus on synthesizing materials and artificial surfaces that replicate the natural function of cells through the release of nitric oxide,” Reynolds, an assistant professor of Chemistry in the College of Natural Sciences at CSU, explains. “These materials can effectively reduce or completely inhibit the complications associated with biologically implanted materials.”

Such biodegradable healing agents could be imbedded in gauze bandages carried by soldiers or stocked in first-aid kits used by relief workers rushing to the scene of earthquakes, tornadoes and other natural disasters, Reynolds says.

They also could be applied on medically implanted devices, such as artificial blood vessels, or on catheters and IVs, to stimulate the body to more readily accept them.

“Then, these devices could last longer, and we would reduce secondary infections and implant rejection and promote faster healing,” Reynolds adds.

Confronted with the risk of life-threatening infections when her own body rejected a shunt, Reynolds is determined to minimize that risk for others. While she was always interested in biomedical research, Reynolds says her own experience “brought home the reality of what patients go through when researchers talk about preventing painful and costly complications for patients. Now, I can’t help but think about what a huge quality of life impact this could be for others.”

With extensive experience in business prior to joining CSU, Reynolds says she enjoys the partnerships between academic, industry and government agencies. She hopes her life-saving coatings will be readily available in some hospitals in about three years.

“We can integrate our platforms with existing medical-device platforms, which should make the transfer from research phase to clinical and human phases much more rapidly,” according to Reynolds.

About CSU Ventures
CSU Ventures assists faculty with transferring research discoveries into the marketplace beyond the university setting. CSU Ventures helps transfer the commercial rights of these innovations to the private sector and assists CSU researchers with the creation of startup companies.

The fund is open to students, staff and faculty of the CSU system, with   projects, programs and  initiatives costing  up to $500,000  being  considered.

Proposals must be related to improving higher education, with a focus on  supporting academic programs, expanding the system's statewide presence,  creating financial sustainability or improving Colorado's future.

The money for the fund came from CSU-Global, the system's online campus.

Applicants must deliver a proposal of no more than three pages that detail  the specific nature of the plan, partnerships or collaborations involved,  expected outcomes and prospects for sustainability.

An committee with representatives from  within and outside the CSU system  will recommend which projects will be funded. The first round of proposals is  due to the CSU system office by June 10, with funding available after July  1.

Courtesy of The Denver Post

Plaintiffs in a case filed against Myriad Genetics are seeking a decision as to whether an isolated DNA molecule with a natural genetic sequence from the human genome should be considered eligible to be patented.

The patent study was led by Gregory Graff, associate professor of agriculture and resource economics at CSU, with the help of a team of researchers at the University of Minnesota and Pennsylvania State University.

The study analyzed U.S. patents and found the case may not have the dramatic impact some in the biotechnology industry fear, CSU said.

However, the study also found that the Supreme Court decision could have unanticipated impacts on patents that claims sequences from non-human species.

“Our intention was to give some sort of measure to the potential legal and commercial implications of what is squaring up to become a landmark patent case, one of the most significant Supreme Court cases in the biological sciences for decades,” Graff said.

The study is the first to draw on a new and massive worldwide compilation of patents related to genetics and genomics put together by Graff and collaborators at the International Science and Technology Practice and Policy Center at the University of Minnesota with funding from the National Institutes of Health.

Results of the study show there are fewer U.S. gene patents – particularly the kinds being challenged in the Myriad case – than prior analysis suggested.

“We caution that some of the hype and drama surrounding the case may be unwarranted and that, if overturned, the impact is unlikely to be devastating to the interests of the biotechnology industry,” Graff said.

“This finding poses a serious question that the U.S. Supreme Court will need to resolve because the Myriad case is, supposedly, only looking at whether human genes are patentable,” he said. “According to our results, there appears to be no simple way, given the logic of genetics or of patent law, to make a clean distinction between the small number of patents that claim human sequences and the larger number of patents that claim sequences from other species.”

The full paper, “Not Quite a Myriad of Gene Patents: Assessing the potential impact of the U.S. Supreme Court on the changing landscape of U.S. patents that claim nucleic acids,” can be viewed at http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/v31/n5/full/nbt.2568.html.

The Monfort Professor Award was established in 2002 through a gift from the Monfort Family Foundation. Prieto and Beachy-Quick will each receive $75,000 annually for two years to support their research projects and teaching efforts. The awards are in addition to the salary and support the professors currently receive from Colorado State.

The professors received their awards Tuesday at the annual Celebrate! Colorado State event.

Nominations for the Monfort Professor Award come from each of the university’s eight colleges. The final selections are made by a committee that looks for individuals who embody the philosophies of Colorado State and have made an impact both at the university and on a larger scale in their field. Recipients are often nominated by colleagues from Colorado State and other universities who recognize their contributions.

Amy Prieto
Prieto, an associate professor in the Department of Chemistry, has received wide acclaim for her research on a powerful, lighter, and cheaper lithium-ion battery that recharges quickly enough to make all-electric cars the go-to green vehicle.

Prieto launched the first startup company through the university’s Clean Energy Supercluster commercialization arm, Cenergy, in 2009. Prieto Battery focuses on producing batteries that are theoretically up to 1,000 times more powerful and 10 times longer-lasting and cheaper than traditional batteries.

Such a powerhouse of a battery could also revive a smartphone in five minutes, and last through as many as 5,000 cycles, Prieto said. It could allow an electric car to go 400 miles with roughly 20-minute charge times.

“Dr. Prieto’s innovative, entrepreneurial approach represents Colorado State’s spirit of enterprise and complex problem-solving focused on devising solutions on a global scale,” said Janice Nerger, dean of the College of Natural Sciences. “A truly worthy recipient of the Monfort Professor Award, Dr. Prieto is an exceptional investigator and scholar, who has helped students gain remarkable experience in renewable technologies.”

In 2012, Prieto also was honored for her work by the White House with a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers. Nominated by the National Science Foundation, Prieto was one of only 96 scientists nationwide to receive the award.

“I am incredibly honored to be a Monfort recipient, and am certainly going to work very hard to uphold the high standard that has been set by previous recipients. This award will allow me and my students to explore new ideas and new directions for the group, so I’m extremely excited and grateful.”

Dan Beachy-Quick
Dan Beachy-Quick, associate professor of English, is one of the most respected poets of his generation and a passionate teacher at CSU. He has published five books of poetry and two essay collections. A novel and a book on John Keats will be released this spring.

“Top poets around the country referred to Dan as ‘one of the most inventive writers of our day, one who will become a part of the canon and will remain there for a long, long time,’” said Ann Gill, dean of the College of Liberal Arts. “They predicted that one of Dan’s published works will ‘enter literary history as one of the magnificent works of our time.’ Such extraordinary and unprecedented national regard for his work raises the stature of Colorado State’s MFA program in creative writing. Add to that Dan’s truly outstanding teaching and outreach activities, and you will understand why I view him as an amazing gift to this university and to our community.”

Beachy-Quick, a native of Lakewood who earned his master’s degree at the prestigious University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop, was inspired to write poetry by one of his Alameda High School teachers. The 39-year-old has been writing ever since.

“My teacher (Becky Porter) helped me fall in love with reading poetry but also helped me find real meaning in it, and how poetry connected with my life,” he said. “Since that time I have really devoted a great portion of my thinking and my life to poetry.”

Beachy-Quick fell in love with teaching while at Grinnell College in Iowa. He landed at CSU six years ago and continues a three-way love affair with writing, teaching and his family – wife Kristy and daughters Hana and Iris. He said much of his writing is inspired by Kristy and his girls.

Teaching, though, has become a deep passion. As much as he loves writing, he delights in seeing those moments when inspiration takes hold in his students.

“That, to me, is more thrilling than finishing a poem, to see that moment when he or she discovers the power in writing a poem or reading a poem, when you see that they understand it at a deep level,” he said. “That’s the great privilege of having a job like this.”

Louann Reid, chair of CSU’s Department of English, said Beachy-Quick brings that rare combination of great talent and great teaching to his work.

“I am thrilled that Dan Beachy-Quick was selected to join the distinguished group of Monfort Professors,” she said. “As the first Monfort Professor from the humanities, Dan brings a perspective to the work this professorship makes possible that is deeply grounded in the exploration, understanding and articulation of human experience. Already recognized as one of the top poets of his generation, he is an outstanding teacher and generous colleague.”

While he remains “flabbergasted” that he was named a Monfort Professor, he plans to make good use of the money that comes with the prestigious title. He will deepen his knowledge of Greek and ancient Greek literature, finish another book of poems and start another novel.

“This gift from the Monforts allows me to spend time with projects I otherwise wouldn’t be able to get to,” he said. “It’s an incredible honor, and I’m still shocked.”

Belisle received his award Tuesday at the university’s annual Celebrate! Colorado State event.

Belisle is recognized for his research in infectious disease. The Scholarship Impact Award, bestowed by the Office of the Vice President for Research, recognizes outstanding faculty whose scholarship has had a major impact nationally and/or internationally. The award includes $10,000 to support his research.

Belisle focuses on the physiology of the bacterium that causes tuberculosis and immune system response, then uses that information find new ways to treat, diagnose and prevent the disease. He directs the National Institutes of Health’s Rocky Mountain Regional Center of Excellence for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases Research, where experts collaborate on infectious disease research.

“John’s career epitomizes the cutting-edge, impactful work done by CSU faculty,” said Bill Farland, vice president for Research at CSU. “He is a world-class researcher, well-respected scholar and a strong ambassador for the great work that we do at CSU. We are very pleased to recognize John with this year’s Scholarship Impact Award.”

Belisle is currently heading up a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant to identify molecules in the urine, saliva or serum that signal a TB infection. The aim of this research is to demonstrate whether these bodily fluids provide a scientifically sound method of diagnosis and could be further developed into products that could be tested in clinical trials.

Belisle is a visionary scientist, working on a wide array of interdisciplinary research across the university. Along with his well-known tuberculosis research, Belisle is currently working on Lyme disease with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and several innovative leprosy studies.

This is the second top honor Belisle has received from CSU. In 2003, he was awarded the prestigious Monfort Professor Award. He was named an Honorary Scientist of the National Veterinary Research & Quarantine Service of the Republic of Korea in 2006. He has served on multiple national or international advisory boards or expert panels addressing various aspects of tuberculosis research. Before becoming director of the Rocky Mountain Regional Center of Excellence, he served as the director of the Mycobacteria Research Laboratories at CSU from 2002 to 2009.

Belisle received his doctoral degree from Colorado State University in 1992, completed a Post Doctoral Fellowship at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center and became a member of the faculty at CSU in 1995.

Steve Porter • FORT COLLINS • InnovatioNews - Origin Ltd., a startup company offering an improvement on the camlock device used by rock climbers, took first place and $10,000 at the first CSU Venture Adventure Challenge held Friday at Rocky Mountain Innosphere.

Origin’s collapsible cam, called the Cam-Keeper, has a patent pending and is expected to bring in $11.9 million in net income by 2017, according to Origin founders Jana and Matt Glanzer, who told competition judges they have two letters of intent from major retail distribution companies.

Origin also won 25 hours of accounting and tax assistance from EKS&H valued at $5,000; six hours of legal service from Rothgerber Johnson and Lyons valued at $2,400; 20 hours of consulting time from Smart2market valued at $1,650; and four hours of accounting and business process assessment from ASI valued at $2,500. [View video interview below.]

Twenty individuals and teams from Colorado State University vied for $22,000 in cash and prizes at the day-long event, making their 10-minute presentations before panels of judges of entrepreneurs – including Colorado Congressman Jared Polis – and angel and venture capital investors.

Finals competition judges included Peter Adams, Rockies Venture Club executive director; David Gold, Access Venture Partners managing director; Mark Kent, Access Venture Partners executive in residence; Erik Mitisek, Colorado Technology Association CEO; and Brian Thomas, OtterBox president and CEO.

The competition was hosted by CSU College of Business’ Institute for Entrepreneurship.

Charisse Bowen, Institute director, said choosing the top five teams was not easy.

“Every team has exceeded expectations as far as their delivery, their concepts and their presentations,” she said. “All the judges were so impressed.”

Placing second and winning $6,000 in the competition was Fort Collins Specialty Foods, which is marketing a chocolate chip enhanced marshmallow for better smores treats.

Third place and $3,000 went to Five Hearts Compost and its Drunken Worm composting system for gardeners.

Fourth place and $2,000 went to The Wild Gym Company, which is producing outdoor fitness equipment for parks.

Fifth place and $1,000 went to Idias BioEnergy, a company whose technology takes CO2 and converts it into valuable algae biomass.

Sponsors for the event included InnovatioNews, EKS&H, Smart2Market, ASI, Rocky Mountain Innosphere, SafeBuilt, Rothberger Johnson & Lyons LLP, Odell Brewing, New Belgium Brewing and Pateros Creek Brewing.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews

As an angel investor who invests in early stage Colorado companies, I am consistently humbled by the fascinating entrepreneurs I have the privilege to meet. It’s very possible that the next Google or Facebook is brewing in a Colorado basement near you, but how can you get a piece of this startup pie?

Here are five ways to invest in Colorado startups:

For accredited investors:

If you meet the SEC investor accreditation requirements, you can:

1) Invest directly as an angel investor. Angel investors are individuals who invest directly in companies through a private placement offering. This is what I do and here is why I love it. Angel investing can be extremely lucrative, but it is also risky and time consuming and therefore, shouldn’t be entered into lightly. If you are an accredited investor interested in angel investments, I would suggest finding an active angel investor to mentor you (contact me at ekraus at impactangelgroup dot com if you need to find a mentor) or reaching out to a local angel group like the Impact Angel Group or the Rockies Venture Club.

2) Invest in startup funds. You can also empower an experienced angel investor to make investments for you by joining a private equity fund. Due to SEC regulations, I cannot publicly share which private equity funds are open to investors, but if you’d like to verify your accreditation status, I would be happy to talk to anyone interested in these types of funds.

For ALL Investors:

If you don’t meet accreditation standards, there are still plenty of ways to invest in Colorado startups. Any investor can:

3) Work for equity. Most startups need more than money. If you have business or technology experience that could contribute to startup success, you may consider working for equity. To find an opportunity to do so, fill out this startup match survey.

4) Join a community bank. Community banks play an important role in financing and supporting the local economy. By banking with a community, rather than a national bank, you can make sure that the majority of your money will be invested locally.

5) Donate to the Fund for Innovation. Although it’s a donation rather than an investment, it’s a killer tax break that also supports Colorado startups. Because the Fund for Innovation is located in a Colorado Enterprise Tax Zone, donors enjoy an additional 25% tax break above and beyond the normal donation tax credit.

Investing in Colorado startups can be a great way to support businesses in your backyard, experience the exciting world of entrepreneurship and if done intelligently, provide a substantial financial return.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews

“We are so pleased to be able to provide this next level of support to our outstanding student startup companies,” said Charisse Bowen, Institute director. “Paving the way to success for these entrepreneurs is my No. 1 priority.”

The student entrepreneurs will be client companies of the Innosphere and have the opportunity to occupy the fully furnished space for 12 months while benefiting from all the service and programs that come with the affiliation.

“Working with CSU’s Institute for Entrepreneurship is an exciting opportunity to work with student startups in a consistent way,” said Mike Freeman, RMI’s CEO.

“This partnership will result in further strengthening our relationship with CSU and provide student entrepreneurs the resources they need for their ideas and new ventures to take flight.”

RMI is currently home to nearly three dozen startups working in clean tech, bioscience and technology, including six CSU Ventures companies based on CSU innovations, and the Hatchery companies will be able to interact with them on a daily basis.

The partnership also includes other local businesses and organizations on campus. The Hatchery offices were furnished with a donation from Officescapes in Fort Collins with office supplies provided by the CSU Bookstore.

For more information, visit http://biz.colostate.edu/ie/pages/default.aspx or contact Bowen at 970-491-2737 or charisse.bowen@business.colostate.edu.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews

The year-long grant, made during the Winter 2013 round of funding, will support Ruiz’s project “Using Audio Cues to Support Motion Gesture Interaction and Accessibility on Mobile Devices.”

To interact with today’s smartphones, users can either touch the screen or physically move the device – shake to shuffle songs or turn sideways to see a bigger image, for example – in what are called motion gestures. One of the goals of this grant is to research techniques that can allow novice users to use such motion gestures as an input modality.

Ruiz will also try to determine the feasibility of using motion gestures to increase the accessibility of smartphone devices for visually impaired users.

According to the application for the Google Award, there are three research questions that Ruiz and his team will consider:
1. How can we communicate to end-users the motion gesture commands that are available on smartphone devices?
2. Can audio cues provide feedback to end-users about how an unsuccessful gesture differs from the desired gesture?
3. Can motion gestures make smartphones more accessible to the visually impaired?

The outcomes of this work will increase the usability and accessibility of smartphones for end-users with disabilities.

Google Research Awards support the work of world-class, full-time faculty members at top universities around the world performing cutting-edge research in computer science. The grants cover tuition and travel for a graduate student and provide faculty and students the opportunity to work directly with Google scientists and engineers.

During the most recent funding round, Google received almost 600 proposals from 46 different countries and decided to fund 102 projects, including this one from Dr. Ruiz.

CSU’s Computer Science Department was also recently named one of the "top nine computer science schools in the world" by David Thielen, founder of Windward Studios in Boulder. A team of CSU students won this year's Windward Code War in January.

For more information, go to http://www.cs.colostate.edu/cstop/index.php

Judges for the student business-pitch competition to be held at Rocky Mountain Innosphere, 320 E. Vine Drive in Fort Collins, include Fourth District Congressman Jared Polis; Brian Thomas, CEO of Otterbox; Peter Adams, CEO, Rockies Venture Club; Ric Denton, CEO, Colorado Springs Technology Incubator; Erik Mitisek, new CEO of the Colorado Technology Association; Kelly Peters of the Northern Colorado Economic Development Corp., and Brad Florin of Colorado Angel Investors.

A total of 15 judges will evaluate the 20 student teams, first in a semi-final round and then in the finals. The top three teams will receive up to $25,000 in cash and in-kind prizes to help launch their ventures.

“This is a fantastic opportunity for the students, who come from all across campus,” said Charisse Bowen, director of the Institute for Entrepreneurship in the CSU College of Business, which is sponsoring the Venture Adventure Challenge. “They will be presenting in front of the very kinds of people, if not the actual people, who they would be pitching in ‘the real world.’”

For this competition, teams are not judged by their business plans, but rather on their ability to present their venture in a compelling and confident manner. Each team will have 10 minutes to present, using no more than 15 slides, followed by 5 minutes of Q&A from the judges.

The competition begins at noon on May 3 at Innosphere, The first round will conclude at 4 p.m. The top five teams will compete in the final round beginning at 5 p.m. the same day. The winners will be announced at 7 p.m. during the awards banquet and reception.

Sponsors of the Venture Adventure include EKS&H, ASI, Smart2Market, Rothgerber Johnson & Lyons LLP, New Belgium Brewing, and Odell Brewing Co.

The event is free and open to the public; the business community is encouraged to attend. To register, go to http://transition.biz.colostate.edu/RSVP/VentureAdventure2013.aspx.

The CSU Hatchery
During the Venture Adventure Challenge, the Institute for Entrepreneurship, CSU Ventures and Innosphere will be announcing an exciting partnership to help successfully launch student startups. The CSU Hatchery is a large office suite at Innosphere, Northern Colorado’s premier business incubator, that will house the top three student companies that graduate from the Institute’s Venture Accelerator Immersion Lab.

The student entrepreneurs will be “client companies” of Innosphere, and have the opportunity to occupy the fully furnished space for 12 months while benefitting from all the services and programs that come with the affiliation. Innosphere is currently home to nearly three dozen startups working in cleantech, bioscience and technology, including six CSU Ventures portfolio companies based on CSU innovations.

Hatchery companies will be able to interact with these entrepreneurs on a daily basis.
The partnership also includes other local businesses and organizations on campus. The Hatchery offices have been furnished through a generous donation from Officescapes in Fort Collins, and office supplies are provided by the CSU Bookstore.

For more information or to find out how to participate in The Hatchery, go to the Institute’s website,http://biz.colostate.edu/ie/pages/default.aspx, or contact Bowen at 970-491-2737 or charisse.bowen@business.colostate.edu

About the CSU Institute for Entrepreneurship
The Institute for Entrepreneurship in the Colorado State University College of Business is working to make entrepreneurship education and training available to the entire CSU community. The Institute is ideally positioned to make a significant impact in fostering venture creation and commercialization for all innovation emerging from the University. Through a strong cross-campus collaborative initiative, the Institute for Entrepreneurship helps foster an entrepreneurial environment in all eight of CSU’s colleges.

About CSU Ventures
CSU Ventures Inc. is a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation that is dedicated to the business of technology transfer and commercialization at Colorado State University, bringing innovations and technologies discovered at CSU into the marketplace for the benefit of society. With expertise in intellectual property, licensing, partnership-building, and entrepreneurship, CSU Ventures protects, manages and transfers CSU innovations by connecting individuals and companies with University researchers. CSU Ventures serves as a resource not only to CSU faculty and researchers, but also to industry, entrepreneurs, and investors seeking to further research or commercialize a technology. The work of CSU Ventures results in new products, businesses, and jobs that positively impact economic growth for Colorado and society as a whole.

For more information, go to www.csuventures.org.

About Rocky Mountain Innosphere
Rocky Mountain Innosphere is a 501(c)3 nonprofit technology incubator located in Fort Collins, Colorado, formed to accelerate the success of high-impact scientific and technology startup companies and promote the development of a regional entrepreneurial ecosystem in Northern Colorado. Currently, Innosphere provides 34 entrepreneurial startup companies with resources such as assistance with raising capital, access and connections with academic and government institutions, a network of advisors and mentors, discounted professional service providers, and educational and networking opportunities for realizing business success.

For more information, go to www.rmi2.org.

Seventeen Colorado companies received $79 million in venture investment in Q1 2013, down 18.3 percent from Q4 2012 and down 43.8 percent from Q1 2012, the report said.

The amount invested in Colorado companies was the lowest since the first quarter of 2010 and the fewest number of deals since 2007, according to the report.

Venture investment in Colorado has been on a downward trend.

Colorado companies received $96.7 million in Q4 2012 compared to $78.995 million in Q1 of this year. The total invested in the state in 2012 was $585.4 million, down from $615.7 million in 2011.

Across the nation, venture capitalists invested $5.9 billion in 863 deals in Q1 2013, down 12 percent in dollars and down 15 percent in number of deals compared to the fourth quarter of 2012, when $6.7 billion was invested in 1,013 deals, the report noted.

Life sciences and clean technology sectors saw the biggest decreases in venture funding, while the software industry had the best quarter, accounting for 40 percent of the money invested in Q1 2013.

“The bright spot in the first quarter was software,” said Tracy Lefteroff, PwC US managing partner of the venture capital practice. These capital-efficient companies that have shorter time frames to a liquidity event – whether that is M&A or IPO – continue to be attractive to an ever-shrinking pool of VC funds.”

For more information, visit www.pwcmoneytree.com or http://www.nvca.org/.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews

Applications are due by May 1 and the application and guidelines are available at www.advancecolorado.com/bdegp.

The BDEGP aims to help grow Colorado’s bioscience industry by advancing new technologies that support innovation, company formation and job creation.

Grants support the commercialization of bioscience technologies licensed from qualified Colorado research institutions with applications in therapeutic or diagnostic products, devices or instruments to improve human health and also in the fields of agriculture and biofuels.

Over the last six years, the program has helped create 37 new companies and the creation of approximately 309 jobs. Last year, more than $5.2 million was awarded to 33 projects.

For more information, visit http://www.advancecolorado.com/.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews

Bradley is the director of CSU’s government- and industry-funded Vehicle Electrification Education and EcoCAR2 programs. EcoCAR2 is a 15-university competition where students create an environmentally sustainable car. Under Bradley’s leadership, CSU is creating the only hydrogen-fuel cell vehicle in the competition.

Since Bradley’s arrival at CSU in 2008, he has conducted research into the technical and economic interactions between the automotive, energy and policy sectors. He has developed a unique body of work that takes systems engineering approaches to the design and interface between hybrid/electric vehicles and their market, fueling infrastructure and customers.

“We are very pleased that Dr. Bradley’s peers have recognized him as an outstanding engineering educator,” said Sue James, chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at CSU. “He is well-deserving of this honor and a major contributor to improving industry relevance of CSU’s education and research efforts.”

The SAE award was created to honor the late Ralph R. Teetor, the 1936 SAE International president who believed in the importance of educators’ impact on future engineers.

“My goal as an engineering educator is to help students realize their goals for innovation, for an improved transportation energy sector, for a career in invention and technology development,” said Bradley. “EcoCAR2 or any of the programs that we engage in here at CSU are designed to provide students with a place to learn, develop and exercise their skills as engineers and innovators."

The award is funded through the SAE Foundation and administered by the Teetor Educational Award Committee. SAE International includes more than 121,000 engineers and technical experts globally, encompassing individuals from the automotive, aerospace and commercial-vehicle industries.

The awards were announced Saturday as part of One Cure, an annual fundraising event hosted by Rick and Melissa Westerman and Meg Cowan, all supporters of CSU’s Flint Animal Cancer Center. One Cure was founded at CSU on the principle that cancer is one disease that affects animals and humans and that a cure for both can be found through collaborative research.

Among the contributors to One Cure is The Anschutz Foundation, which has been a major contributor to the center over the past several years and has helped expand cancer clinical trials for collaborative research between CSU and the University of Colorado Comprehensive Cancer Center on The Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora.

“The very generous awards from The Anschutz Foundation and other partners contribute greatly to our fight against cancer in animals that ultimately helps people,” said Dr. Mark Stetter, dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at CSU. “Our mission at the college is to help animals, people and the planet, whether that’s through research on environmental health, infectious disease or cancer.”

“This program will leverage and strengthen collaborations between Colorado State University and the University of Colorado in a partnership to coordinate companion animal and human studies,” said Dr. Rod Page, director of the center at CSU. “We are tremendously grateful to The Anschutz Foundation and all of our One Cure friends for their ongoing support of this critical research that is bringing innovative treatments to our patients as well as improving clinical research in people.”

The Flint Animal Cancer Center is a pioneer on an international stage in the fight against cancer in pets and people and a flagship program for CSU’s College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences through its prominence in teaching, service to individuals with pets that have cancer and translational research. The facility opened in 2002 to offer ever-improving care to companion animals with cancer and to further collaborations between veterinarians, physicians and scientists working toward a cure.

The Flint Animal Cancer Center evaluates 1,800 new cancer patients a year from around the world and provides leading technologies in imaging, radiation therapy, surgery, chemotherapy and pain management as well as opportunities for clinical trial participation.

The clinical trials supported through One Cure would create an institutional collaboration between CSU and CU for translational and comparative clinical cancer research. The clinical trials program of the Flint Animal Cancer Center currently supports 20 to 25 trials annually. Financial support is needed to greatly increase the number of trials and enrollment with adequate facilities and resources in both Fort Collins and Denver.

The Oncology Comparative Clinical Trials Program will:

• Solidify the oncology clinical trials program hub at CSU.

• Create a strong network with veterinarians in the Denver metro region to expedite clinical research regionally.

• Expand research partnerships and resources with the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center/Comprehensive Cancer Center on the Anschutz Medical Campus.

“We have made great strides in our battle against cancer,” Page said. “Today more than 50 percent of companion animals with cancer can be successfully managed or cured thanks to innovations discovered through clinical research.”

Highlights of the center’s accomplishments over the past several decades:

• First “limb-sparing” surgical procedures that have saved the limbs of tens of thousands of children across the world and are still in use today.

• First veterinary biorepository that provided a “library” of tissue samples from cancer patients used to unlock the mysteries of the disease. Current holdings are over 20,000 samples from 2,000 patients.

• Clinical trial at CSU for canine patients with oral cancer defines a new radiation treatment protocol that is applied to human patients.

• Clinical trial in dogs at CSU redefines chemotherapy delivery for bone cancer and leads to widespread use in child cancer patients.

• Immunotherapy delays the spread of bone cancer, first verified in canine patients at CSU and the University of Wisconsin, later used to benefit human patients.

Current areas of clinical research focus continue to be in treatment innovations including cancer immunotherapeutic strategies, novel drug therapies, advanced radiation therapy protocols and nutrition. For more information, go to http://www.csuanimalcancercenter.org/.

To give to One Cure, go to http://www.csuanimalcancercenter.org/onecure. Supporters can also purchase One Cure pet products at http://www.vettext.org/ to help spread the message that pets and people battle cancer together and that together they can be part of a cure.

That was one of the messages delivered by panelists at the CSU Ventures 2013 Innovation Symposium held Friday at Rocky Mountain Innosphere.

Mike Freeman, RMI’s CEO, said the region is becoming a fountain of technology startup activity with 36 client companies attached to RMI alone.

 “There’s a huge number of potential startups, not including those coming out of CSU or the community, that aren’t even on the radar,” he said.

But Freeman noted that access to investment capital remains a major hurdle for Northern Colorado startups, and RMI has taken several steps to expand access to a variety of funding sources, including establishing a local angel investor group and an early-stage debt fund.

“The big thing we’re putting in place now is a venture fund capitalized by banks, the first in Colorado,” he said.

Freeman was joined on the panel by Todd Headley, CSU Ventures president; Amy Prieto, CSU chemistry professor and founder of Prieto Battery; Melissa Reynolds, chemistry professor and founder of Diazamed; and Greg Graff, agricultural and resource economics professor.

Panelists discussed the challenges facing entrepreneurs in taking their ideas from the laboratory to the marketplace.

Money is one of the challenges, but another is finding a way for CSU faculty to hand off technology to someone who can drive the business to financial success, said Headley.

“One of the things we found over the last few years is we need to help faculty members find business drivers to work with them, to run the business so they can focus on the technical aspects,” he said.

Reynolds said turning over that business role to others was freeing for her. “I’m no longer the CEO and I’m really happy about it,” she said. “The support system that CSU Ventures provided was very key to that.”

Prieto said she’s not been able to find that with her incipient business. “I have not found that (driver) and it’s been really very painful,” she said. “Figuring out a way to groom really good people is really important.”

Graff said while Northern Colorado may be perceived by the outside investment world as somewhat invisible, it shouldn’t be.

“When you expand (Northern Colorado) to Denver, we’re a region of 3 million people,” he said. “I feel passionately that we have great resources in the university. We live in a knowledge economy, and we need to own up to it.”

Headley said the region is working more collaboratively than ever. “We are working better together, but we know we have a number of shortcomings, whether it’s money or talent,” he said. “But I know we’re making progress and what we’re doing is working.”

About 100 people attended the symposium hosted by CSU Ventures, which manages tech transfer for the university.

In addition to the panel, Ken Reardon, CSU mechanical engineering professor, talked about some of the lessons he learned while taking his groundwater biosensor technology from an idea to the creation of OptiEnz Sensors, now an RMI incubator company.

Colorado State University students also had a chance to spotlight their research at the symposium, with 27 posters displayed detailing some of the most innovative and cutting-edge work going on in classrooms and laboratories across campus.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews

An Earth Week Symposium on Clean Energy

April 18 – Main Ballroom – LSC

RSVP Here!

9:00 - 9:30: Introduction – Tony Rappé

9:30-11:00: Biomass

Panel Discussion: CSU’s Role in Displacement of Petrochemicals with Renewable Options

11:00 - 12:00: Student & Faculty Research Posters

12:00-1:30: Solar

Panel Discussion: CSU’s Efforts to Take Solar Beyond Silicon Photovoltaics

1:30 - 2:30: Student & Faculty Research Posters

2:30-4:00: Efficiency

Panel Discussion: CSU’s Approach to Energy Efficiency, Perhaps the Cleanest Option

* Panelists will address major challenges, what CSU is researching, and how students, faculty, and industry can get Involved.

7:30 - 9:00 PM Screening - Behavioral Sciences Auditorium

Switch: A new documentary film that looks at where our energy comes from and where it will likely come from in the future.

Don't forget to Register at:http://energy.colostate.edu/OurEnergyFuture2013.html 

Prawel, a senior research scientist in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, has opened the Idea-2-Product Laboratory to the community so anyone can use this amazing 3-D printing equipment to create prototypes and products, repair parts, beautiful artwork, or virtually anything they can imagine. The lab is staffed by current and graduated engineering students who can provide design and printing expertise. Prawel charges a small fee to recoup costs of materials and maintenance.

“3D printing is very high-value technology that has been proven to increase innovation and accelerate time-to-market for countless entrepreneurs and companies,” said Prawel, who has 31 years of experience working with 3D software and companies, including six companies he helped create. “We provide the equipment and expertise; our users provide the ideas and innovation. You can’t steer innovation – you just have to provide the tools and put some water on it and let it go.”

“The lab currently has five, soon to be seven, machines that can print up to 18 types of materials and create intricate designs that couldn’t be created any other way,” Prawel added. One or two more machines are available for use in the Morgan Library depending on the demand for the machines in the laboratory.

“We’re already at capacity – we are running these machines full-time,” Prawel explained, noting that staff assists users until they’re are certified to use the devices themselves. “Users learn how to make their ideas become real products, and on the way they learn things like computer-assisted design and manufacturing and all kinds of things they’ve never thought of before. This helps satisfy the educational mission of our lab.”

Erica Suchman, a professor in the CSU Department of Microbiology Immunology and Pathology, is working with the lab to develop 3-D printed models of virus-antibody models that can be snapped together to create unique epitope binding sites. This allows students to create different antibodies with specificity to different epitopes or shapes on the surface of 3D-printed viruses.

“These models will be given to the students in the class to manipulate creating different antibodies and exploring where on the virus these antibodies can bind, allowing them to visualize a difficult special concept,” said Suchman, who is in the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.

I2P software and equipment are funded by contributions from Autodesk, Lulzbot, Advanced Manufacturing Enterprises, the Mechanical Engineering Department and by CSU’s students through the university’s Student Fee Review Board. I2P would also like to acknowledge the vision and assistance of the Morgan Library for space, resources and technical support.

Position: Technology Transfer Communications Intern with CSU Ventures, http://www.csuventures.org

Must be enrolled in Journalism and Technical Communication program at CSU

Hours per Week: Minimum of 5 hours/week, (50 hours or more per semester)
Pay: $500 per semester

To apply: E-mail resume and cover letter to gena.stokes@colostate.edu or call 970-491-7100

Accepting resumes and inquiries now through May 15, 2013

Intern Responsibilities (position may be tailored to suit intern’s strengths/talents)

• Assist with writing and/or editing copy and updating website.
• Develop creative strategies and assist with planning and coordination of annual awards ceremony.
• Help develop and implement marketing strategies for social media and website.
• Updating social media pages with fresh content.
• Assist with creation and distribution of quarterly newsletter using Constant Contact.
• Assist with various communications, public relations, event planning and campus in-reach tasks.
• Assist with grant management tasks.
• Basic administrative tasks – filing, creating files/labels, etc.
• Other tasks as assigned.

Preferred Skills/Knowledge

• Knowledge of public relations and news writing/editing fundamentals.
• Social media savvy.
• Event Coordination and Planning
• Great attitude and willingness to assist in various types of tasks.
• Strong work ethic and attention to detail.
• Ability to translate technical/scientific information into lay terms.
• Proficiency in MS Word, Publisher, Excel and internet research. HTML/web expertise helpful.

2-day Program for Start-up Companies
April 18-19, 2013

Attendees will learn valuable information from experienced entrepreneurs about how to build a company.

"This has been the best 2 day program I have ever attended both on the depth of the content and the quality of speakers. In addition, the networking and collaborations that spawned from this event were excellent."

Past program participant

DAY ONE: Business Focused Sessions

Overview: "So you want to start a life science company?"

Company Formation: "Nuts and bolts of starting a business"

Understanding the Technology Transfer Operation & Funding Opportunities

Intellectual Property: "Protecting your technology"
Transitioning your Management Team

Compensating your Management Team
State & Community Resources
Company Valuation Part I: Company Perspective/II: Investor Perspective
Dilutive Funding Panel: Angel, Venture Capital and Strategic Investors

Getting the Deal Done: Diligence and term sheets

DAY TWO: R&D Focused Sessions

Breakfast

Track I & II

Drugs and Vaccines: Preclinical Development/ Regulatory Affairs
Medical Device & Diagnostic: Development Part / Regulatory Affairs

Clinical Development Overview

Reimbursement: Drugs, Vaccines, Devices & Diagnostics

Includes complimentary meals and reception

Presenters Include:

Clay Anselmo, Reglera

Ken Dropiewski, Prime-Core Executive Search

Brenda Fielding, Regulus

April Giles, Colorado BioScience Association

Brad Hattenbach, Dorsey & Whitney

Greg Miknis, C2D2

Sean Moriarty, Tolmar

Terry Opgenorth, Ph.D., CSU Ventures
Tom Smerdon, CU Technology Transfer Office

Kevin Smith, CID4

Patty Telgener, Emerson Consultants

Jonathan Thorne, Edgeport Surgical

Will Vaughan, Technology Transfer Colorado School of Mines

Michael Weiner, Dorsey & Whitney

Tim Worrall, Dorsey & Whitney

Apply Today

Submit application by April 5, 2013 via email

There is no fee for this program. However, applicants must apply for admittance.

Tracey Nilson, Program Manager

tnilson@cobioscience.com

The two-day event will be held from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day at the Hilton Fort Collins, 425 W. Prospect Road. The event is free and open to the public but reservations are required, Click here for registration information.

Dr. Lawrence I. Sinoway of the Hershey Medical Center in Pennsylvania will give the keynote address on April 4. Co-chairing the event are Scott Earley, CSU Department of Biomedical Sciences, and Frank Dinenno, CSU Department of Health and Exercise Science.

The colloquium will include three scientific sessions on Basic Cardiovascular Science, Clinical/Applied Cardiovascular Science and Cardiovascular Epidemiology/Population Genetics.

In addition to highlighting cutting-edge research and innovative technology, the event will provide an opportunity for local cardiovascular scientists and other CSU faculty, students and staff to enhance collaborations and communication across the campus, CSU said.

Sponsors include the Office of the Vice President of Research, Colorado School of Public Health, Colorado State University Research Foundation, CSU Ventures, Colorado BioScience Association, Medical Center of the Rockies/University of Colorado Health and the Hilton Fort Collins.

For more information, visit www.vpr.colostate.edu/urc.

Courtesy of Steve Porter @ InnovatioNews

The symposium will be held 4-7 p.m. at the Rocky Mountain Innosphere building, 320 E. Vine Drive. Space is limited, so registration is required by April 1 at www.csuventures.org/events.php or by calling (970) 491-7100.

Speakers include faculty members who have started companies and commercialization experts:

• Ken Reardon, professor, Chemical and Biological Engineering
• Melissa Reynolds, assistant professor, Chemistry
• Amy Prieto, associate professor, Chemistry
• Greg Graff, associate professor, Agricultural and Resource Economics
• Todd Headley, president, CSU Ventures
• Mike Freeman, CEO, Rocky Mountain Innosphere

The symposium will include poster sessions that highlight cutting-edge research at the university and discussions about the innovative nature of northern Colorado.

Students may also present their research at the event. All projects must demonstrate innovation and contain commercial potential. Submit an abstract of no more than 500 words to Steve Foster at steve.foster@colostate.edu by March 29.

For more than 50 years, CSU Ventures and the Colorado State University Research Foundation have assisted faculty with the process of transferring new discoveries into the marketplace beyond the university setting. CSU Ventures helps transfer the commercial rights of these innovations to the private sector and assists researchers with the creation of startup companies.

Beginning March 16, the U.S. implemented major reform to its patent system under the America Invents Act. Of particular note, the U.S. has transitioned from a “first to invent” system to “first to file.”

In certain cases, two parties can create substantially identical inventions completely independently of each other. Previously, the person who could document he or she was first to create the invention would be granted the patent, regardless of whether the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office received the application first.

Now, under a “first to file” system, the first inventor to file with the patent office will be eligible for the patent. Although new to the U.S., this system has already been in place in much of the world.

Colorado State University has primary missions of education, research, extension and service. CSU Ventures is charged to enhance CSU’s missions by protecting, disseminating and commercializing research results and innovations to benefit society, a process commonly known as technology transfer.

Part of the technology transfer process includes protecting CSU inventions with patents and licensing them to companies. CSU Ventures has been applying for patents on CSU inventions with commercial potential as early as possible.

Using this early patent filing strategy — a tactic often employed by small businesses — allows our office to transition to this new patent system without major challenges. In addition, we continue to educate university researchers and field questions about patent reform and its effects.

Whatever changes may come, we will continue to adapt and exercise a best practice to optimize potentially valuable CSU inventions.

Other possible benefits to the U.S. patent system under the new law include: an option to expedite the examination of certain patent applications; reduction of the current patent application backlog and litigation action pending in the patent office; an increase in patent quality and greater ability for U.S. inventors to protect their rights abroad.

Individual inventors and small businesses will reap an added cost benefit in that they could qualify for patent application filing fees as “micro entities,” receiving a 75 percent discount from the large entity fee.

Hopefully, this patent process switch will benefit CSU inventions and the startups CSU Ventures has helped create to further develop these technologies. Ultimately, these companies could enhance economic development in the Front Range, and the nation, which was the intent of the America Invents Act.

Todd Headley is president of CSU Ventures.

Courtesy of The Coloradoan

Paul Tanger is a 2012-2013 CSU Sustainability Leadership Fellow with the School of Global Environmental Sustainability, also known as SoGES, and a graduate student in the College of Agricultural Sciences. Paul was selected based on his accomplishments at the interface of science and policy.

“We are excited that Paul will receive this prestigious award for his interest in communicating science to policy makers," said Diana Wall, Director of the CSU School of Global Environmental Sustainability. “He has already been honored as one of 20 Global Sustainability Leadership Fellows at CSU who we train to explain the broader benefits of their research.”

The American Institute of Biological Sciences will bring Tanger to Washington in March to meet with Colorado Congressional delegations and to participate in a training program on communicating science with policymakers. He will also be briefed on the federal budget for scientific research as part of the annual Biological and Ecological Sciences Coalition Congressional Visits Day.

The other awardee is a Ph.D. student from MIT.

The American Institute of Biological Sciences is an institution that strives to build community in support of researchers, educators and scientists who understand the importance of sharing biological discovery and knowledge. Tanger was chosen because he “shows great accomplishments, communication skills, and promise for continued leadership at the boundary of science and public policy,” his award letter stated.

Tanger is a student with Jan E. Leach, professor in the Department of Bioagricultural Sciences and Pest Management and the NSF IGERT Program in Multidisciplinary Approaches to Sustainable Bioenergy (MAS BioEnergy). Tanger studies how plant composition can be optimized to produce inexpensive bioenergy. He will accept his award April 10-11 in Washington.

First, Diana Wall has some talking to do in Washington, D.C. She's being awarded the Tyler Prize — the premier international award for environmental science.

It honors exceptional foresight and dedication and comes with a $200,000 cash prize and a gold medal.

Previous winners include Jane Goodall, Thomas Lovejoy and Edward Wilson.

"I never would have dreamed that soil, or soil animals, ever would have been recognized with this type of award," Wall said in an interview.

"Given the uncertainty of our overall research funds, this is a real welcome add-on," Wall said. "It's certainly going to help me with my research. It is a huge validation — not only a recognition of soil life and the work in Antarctica but a recognition that many different disciplines can come together to work on this."

The exploits of tiny soil creatures — squirming nematodes, water bears, mites and springtails — are a growing focus for climate-change scientists because the bugs play a key role in the health of soils that people depend on for food and water.                                                                                                                                      

CSU president Tony Frank lauded Wall as "an inspiration to our students and a wonderful colleague."

Wall's research "tells an incredible story of how our world is changing — and she's helped us better understand the role we play in developing a sustainable future," Frank said.

Wall's latest experiment in Antarctica — she has worked there for 24 seasons — involves flooding frozen tundra with water so that her team can study what happens with the melting that climate models anticipate. The hypothesis: Algae will emerge on top of Antarctic soil.

"Climate-change melting is going to mean sea-level rise. That's why people are concerned at both poles," Wall said.

"Antarctica controls ocean currents. So if we start changing the surface down there — we start having more brown, more ice melting, more soil exposed — that changes the amount of sun that is absorbed," she said. "This is going to influence, globally, the type of climate we have."

Geopolitical maneuvering has begun as nations beef up their research presence at the poles with an eye toward mining oil, gas and other minerals. As glaciers shrink, more soil is likely to open up. Yet the fertility of that soil is uncertain.

"Soil life is helping sustain us," Wall said. "We cannot ignore it anymore."

Courtesy of The Denver Post

Honorees in the Young Investigator Research Program are U.S. scientists or engineers who received Ph.D. or equivalent degrees in the last five years and “show exceptional ability and promise for conducting basic research.”

Pasricha, who has a joint appointment in the Department of Computer Science at Colorado State, is the only scientist in Colorado to receive the award in 2013.

“Sudeep is conducting cutting-edge research in his field and he is certainly deserving of this prestigious award,” said Tony Maciejewski, head of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Pasricha obtained the award for his research proposal, “Integrated Optoelectronic Networks for Application-Driven Multicore Computing,” which aims to determine the best modalities for integrating emerging photonics technology into multicore electronic chips that drive all major modern inventions such as vehicles and airplanes, computers and phones, scientific and industrial infrastructure, as well as military systems.

His research is expected to lay the groundwork for realizing electronic systems that perform at much greater levels of efficiency, reliability, and cost-effectiveness than electronic systems today.

Pasricha joined the Colorado State University faculty after receiving his Ph.D. in 2008 from the University of California, Irvine. His research interests are in the areas of embedded systems, mobile computing, CAD algorithms, networks-on-chip and emerging interconnect technologies (photonics, carbon nanotube, 3D), heterogeneous computing, memory architectures, and low-power, thermal-aware, and fault-tolerant computing.

Among the awards he has received in his short time at Colorado State University include Best Paper Awards at the IEEE AICCSA 2011 and IEEE ISQED 2010 conferences, and the 2012 ACM SIGDA Technical Leadership Award. His current research is sponsored by research grants from the National Science Foundation, Semiconductor Research Corp., Air Force Office of Scientific Research and Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The Young Investigator Research Program is intended to foster creative basic research in science and engineering, enhance early career development of outstanding young investigators, and increase opportunities for the young investigators to recognize the Air Force mission and the related challenges in science and engineering.

The 40 scientists were chosen from 192 proposals in areas of interest to the Air Force including aerospace, chemical and material sciences; physics and electronics; and mathematics, information and life sciences.

jobZology has licensed scientific technology developed by Colorado State psychology professors Bryan Dik and Kurt Kraiger that measures employee satisfaction and organizational culture, and helps companies use that data to improve their businesses and hire employees who will be a good fit. The technology was licensed through CSU Ventures, the commercialization arm of the university.

“We help organizations measure how employees feel about the culture they’re building and provide them data about whether employees are satisfied with, and committed and loyal to, the company, the culture, their job and their role,” said Eric Leftwich, jobZology chief revenue officer and Colorado State alumnus.

“jobZology is helping companies obtain honest and accurate data about their most valuable asset, their employees,” said Nicole Shestak, who handles human resources for In-Situ Inc., based in Fort Collins. “The results of the employee survey gave In-Situ a candid look into employee workplace attitudes. We were able to analyze employee alignment, engagement, morale, commitment, loyalty, and overall satisfaction. Now we are using the tools to evaluate job candidates to ensure they are compatible with our organizational culture and that they are suited to their desired roles. In-Situ is already using the employee survey data to shape our evolving culture, while improving performance, retention, and engagement.”

“We’re going to help Northern Colorado people love their jobs,” Leftwich said. “It’s scientifically based matching for key factors employees need to be happy in their work lives. When a job can meet those key needs, it leads to overall workplace happiness and ultimately the satisfaction of doing meaningful work.

“We see a future in which Northern Colorado maintains this database of job seekers that have been profiled for cultural fit, whether you’re currently employed, unemployed, or thinking about changing jobs,” Leftwich added. “Job seekers and employers can find each other in this database and when they do, how cool would that be for the economic development of our community?”

As part of an earlier CSU grant, Dik and Kraiger created proprietary algorithms for matching people to jobs and organizational cultures. The assessment system measures current employees’ job satisfaction, commitment and loyalty.

Ultimately, jobZology helps companies find and retain happy employees who are more loyal and engaged.

“Human capital is really important to us, and having a good feel for the cultural and working environment at Home State Bank is one of the most important issues for management,” said Mark Bower, executive vice president and chief financial and operations officer at Home State Bank in Fort Collins. “Having the tools from jobZology helped us.”

jobZology currently offers three products to companies:

• jobZology FiSCL Assessment—a cultural scorecard that measures employee satisfaction, commitment, and loyalty
• jobZology VIP Assessment—an online career assessment system that provides useful feedback to existing employees or job-seekers while collecting key information about their fit to the culture and to particular job openings within the company
• jobZology Reliant Live—a talent management system designed to track current employees for training, evaluation, performance, and succession plans for employers

“Our system provides the employer with a baseline of employees’ job satisfaction, work engagement, withdrawal intentions, and numerous other helpful insights,” said Travis Hevelone, CEO of jobZology. “This enables business leaders to make decisions based on fact rather than intuition.”

Eventually, the company seeks to create a database, free for job-seekers to enter their information, where employers could find the people they need. But that match would involve more than just finding someone looking to work at a manufacturing plant or someone with technology skills; it would help employers find people who would be a good fit within their roles, jobs and work cultures. Such a service would also help employees determine what they need to be happy in the workplace.

The database would help match that employee with an employer.

“Employers are making critical hiring decisions based on their gut feel of the person or by performing keyword searches against job boards, which is inefficient and broken,” Hevelone said. “We want to flip the script. Fit matters and should be first in talent selection. Skills are much easier to teach. You can’t change someone’s values, so why not hire for them?”

For more information on jobZology, go to http://www.jobzology.com/.

“Tom, like all of our CSU chemistry faculty, is committed to conducting innovative research that advances learning and is based in new discoveries that will help the world around us,” said Chemistry Department Chair Ellen Fisher. “It is always exciting when our professors receive recognition for their work.”

The Heterocyclic Chemistry Katriztky Award is an international award given to individuals who have made advancements in this field of chemistry, which largely revolves around the synthesis of ring compounds containing two or more types of atoms. This particular class of compounds has numerous applications including many pharmaceuticals, pesticides, herbicides, and biological molecules such as DNA. Rovis was nominated by Robert Williams, CSU University Distinguished Professor in chemistry.

“Tom’s contributions to the field of heterocyclic chemistry rank him among the world’s leaders in his age group,” said Williams. “His work transcends the typical approaches that synthetic organic chemists have used to prepare heterocyclic substances. Among the younger generation, few have made such a contribution to heterocycles as catalysts as well as new approaches to heterocycles as the products of the reactions he has devised.”

In his research, Rovis uses small organic molecules to create tools or catalysts that make more elaborate molecules for pharmaceuticals that could lead to treatments for cancer and other diseases. This is a critical piece of research and development for pharmaceutical companies who must create and test thousands of molecules to fashion new drugs.

In December, the American Association for the Advancement of Science honored Rovis with the distinction of Fellow “for distinguished contributions to the field of chemical synthesis, particularly for the development of nucleophilic carbene catalysis and asymmetric umpolung.”

Rovis’ recent discovery - creating an artificial enzyme made of metal and organic matter - could speed up the drug discovery process. In October, Rovis and his fifth-year doctoral student Todd Hyster, in collaboration with Professor Thomas R. Ward and Livia Knörr at the University of Basel, published a paper in Science about that research. The new enzyme could allow scientists to build many more complicated molecules necessary for creating drugs and cut months of work into days.

U.S. News and World Report has named the graduate program in chemistry at Colorado State University one of the top 50 programs in the country. The ranking was included in the 2011 Edition of America’s Best Graduate Schools.

The chemistry department is a Program of Research and Scholarly Excellence at Colorado State. Research Ph.D. programs are available in analytical, inorganic, organic, physical, and materials chemistry as well as chemistry education. Interdisciplinary programs of study that cross traditional boundaries are encouraged and many faculty members have joint appointments in engineering and life sciences departments across campus. The department’s total grant expenditures exceed $7 million annually.

“The Reinvention Center is the only national organization focusing exclusively on undergraduate education at research universities, and it is a great honor for Colorado State to be the institutional host for the initiative,” CSU Provost and Executive Vice President Rick Miranda said. “While The Reinvention Center is not specifically a CSU program, its location in Fort Collins presents significant opportunities for administrators, faculty and staff across campus to continue our ongoing effort to enhance undergraduate learning and persistence to graduation.”

The Reinvention Center consortium includes some of the nation’s most prestigious research universities, such as Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, MIT, Case Western Reserve, Stanford, University of Colorado at Boulder and several institutions in the University of California system. The Center was initially housed at the State University of New York at Stony Brook and most recently at the University of Miami.

”The decision to move The Reinvention Center to Colorado State is really a tribute to Alan Lamborn and his involvement in efforts – on our campus, statewide, and nationally -- to transform the quality of undergraduate education,” CSU President Tony Frank said. “CSU has made student success and persistence a priority, and our significant progress on that front is a result of the strategic efforts of people like Alan, our faculty, and many others who have been willing to innovate and explore new approaches to advance student learning.”

To emphasize the equal importance of curricular and co-curricular experiences to undergraduate education, Blanche Hughes, CSU’s Vice President for Student Affairs, has been appointed the newest member of The Reinvention Center’s board.

Quality of undergraduate education enhanced

The Reinvention Center was created in response to the 1998 Boyer Commission report, Reinventing Undergraduate Education: A Blueprint for America’s Research Universities. The report found that while universities such as CSU, which derive significant portions of their budgets from faculty and graduate-level research, award about a third of all undergraduate degrees, at the time little attention was being paid to the quality of undergraduate teaching and learning. The Center’s mission is to strengthen education for undergraduates by calling on the unique attributes of the research university environment.

Lamborn, who has long been active in The Reinvention Center, said the goals of the consortium are closely aligned with student success initiatives that were begun at Colorado State nearly a decade ago.

“The most effective strategies for success are those that enrich the educational experience,” Lamborn said. “Learning and the quality of the undergraduate experience must underlie all our strategies. In many ways, the initiatives that were approved by the CSU Board of Governors in 2006 are Colorado State’s version of the Boyer Report.”

Inspiring collaboration

As a result of these initiatives, and further challenges from President Frank to improve graduation rates, CSU has increased retention of first-time, full-time freshmen to a record high of 84.7 percent, and reduced time to graduation. CSU continues to work toward eliminating graduation gaps without diminishing the commitment to access and upward mobility that is part of its mission as a land-grant university.

“As the institutional host for the Reinvention Center, Colorado State will be in a unique position to learn from our colleagues at other research universities and to share some of our own best practices as part of a collaborative effort to accelerate and deepen innovation in undergraduate education throughout the nation,” Lamborn said.

The relocation of the Center to Fort Collins has already inspired a $150,000 gift to CSU’s Institute for Learning and Teaching (TILT) to inspire faculty to develop courses that deepen student learning and enhance undergraduate success. The TILT/Reinvention Center Science of Learning Course Development Competition is designed to inspire faculty across campus to apply principles of the science of learning to improve the entire education experience at CSU.

Courtesy of Today at Colorado State

At Colorado State University, a team of researchers and industry sponsors has developed a patented technology that helps assess the rates of microbial degradation of petroleum in soils.

These estimates are important as they provide a baseline to compare the rates achievable with active remedies, and also estimate the longevity of these sources of contamination.

The team included research scientist Julio Zimbron and Tom Sale, a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Zimbron took the team’s patented technology and founded a company called E-Flux, which leases carbon dioxide traps to users and analyzes the data collected in the traps.

Mother Nature plays a big role in the process. Naturally occurring microbes break down the oil in the soil and convert it into CO2.

“It’s about establishing the rates of petroleum degradation in the soil,” Zimbron said, noting that petroleum degrades over time into carbon dioxide gas, which then migrates through the soil to the surface.

The CO2 is captured in the carbon dioxide traps – essentially PVC canisters partially buried in the ground above a spill area that contain a granular absorbent material that stabilizes and holds the CO2.

Left in place from two to four weeks, the canisters are then shipped back to E-Flux for analysis.

“It’s a very simple idea,” said Zimbron. “We simply capture the gases as they come out of the ground.”

Simple, but effective, and with a reasonably precise measurement of the CO2 rising up from the spill, those responsible for its cleanup can better determine what alternatives are needed to remediate it.

“It’s very important for making an assessment for remediation,” Zimbron said. “People can spend a small fortune pumping oil (spills) out of the ground.

“Oil recovery might make sense if the yields are large, but these change through the life of a project, and at some point remediation approaches should be reassessed.”

Zimbron said E-Flux has so far installed CO2 traps at 18 locations across the U.S with more than 500 traps installed.

E-Flux is a CSU Ventures startup tenant at the CSU Research Innovation Center on the Foothills Campus and is also an off-site client of Rocky Mountain Innosphere in Fort Collins, where Zimbron said RMI’s SAGE (Social and Advisory Group for Entrepreneurs) program of experienced entrepreneur mentors has proved invaluable.

“I have nothing but good things to say about them,” he said. “In the last three months, I’ve learned so much from them. They’ve been so helpful and generous with their time.”

E-Flux’s customers include energy companies, pipeline owners and owners of property where spills have occurred over time, such as railroad yards.

Zimbron said he has high expectations for marketing the E-Flux technology at a time when demand for such a product is likely to grow dramatically.

“We’re a startup that was able to hit the ground running,” he said. “It shows we’ve done our homework addressing a real need.”

Jeremy Nelson, director of licensing and business development for CSU Ventures, said E-Flux is “a great example of the way university research can translate into real-world applications and help real-world people out.”

Courtesy of InnovatioNews

“It’s great to see local businesses recognizing the value of supporting Innosphere’s entrepreneurial programs like New Tech Meetup,” said Mike Freeman, Innosphere CEO. “I’m thrilled to have Flood and Peterson as a new partner – we both advise companies on making important business decisions and understand the value that experienced entrepreneurs can bring to others trying to start their own business.”

Flood and Peterson’s sponsorship will be used by the Innosphere to continue to bring value to their client companies by connecting them to the great resources right here in our region. “Flood and Peterson is one of those resources,” said Doug Johnson, Innosphere VP of capital access. “Since they are more than an insurance seller, they can also be a resource for new companies when it comes to contracts, risk and liability.”

New Tech Meetup, a volunteer-led group that engages the startup community to help early-stage software and technology startups, is held at the Innosphere from 6-8pm on the second Tuesday of every month. “New Tech Meetup is only possible with support from the community,” said Christine Hudson, Startup Colorado executive committee member and Fort Collins New Tech founder. “It’s about building an entrepreneurial ecosystem that benefits the entire community.”

"We’re excited to be supporting the Innosphere and their efforts to engage, assist and educate our startup community," said Brett Kemp, VP of the Flood and Peterson Fort Collins office. “Since our goal is to help our clients boost their operational competitiveness and maximize their profits, we’re excited to support this critical networking event to support the high paying, high growth software innovation community in our region.”

Flood and Peterson services include commercial insurance, employee benefits, personal insurance, corporate 401k, risk management, and surety Bonds. Flood and Peterson, which serves clients nationwide and around the world, is a member of the Sitkins 100™, a group of 100 insurance firms across the United States that offer broader, more ongoing customer-centric insurance and risk-management services.

Rocky Mountain Innosphere accelerates the success of high-impact scientific and technology startup companies and promotes the development of a regional entrepreneurial ecosystem in Northern Colorado. Currently, Innosphere provides 34 start-up companies with resources such as assistance with raising capital, access and connections with academic and government institutions, a network of advisors and mentors, discounted professional service providers, and educational and networking opportunities for realizing business success.

For more information contact Mike Freeman, CEO, Rocky Mountain Innosphere (970) 818-7736.

KromaTiD's BDEGP grant is dedicated to the product launch of our novel research tools for cancers, developmental disor-ders and other genetic diseases. KromaTiD's unique assays provide disease researchers with the tools they need to under-stand the root causes of genetic disease and to develop new companion diagnostic tests. BDGEP will support sales and marketing of KromaTiD's chromosome imaging assays, includ-ing newly hired sales and applications development professionals.

http://www.kromatid.com/

Courtesy of the Colorado Bioscience Association

Or in the case of Jan Leach, a distinguished professor of plant pathology at Colorado State University, right outside her greenhouse.

In 2008, after decades of working with a bacterium to improve rice plants, Leach was notified by the U.S. Department of Agriculture that the strain had been declared a "select agent," meaning it could be used by a bioterrorist to threaten the public, plants or animals.

To continue her work, Leach had to remodel her lab and her greenhouse to fit government protocols. Also, each one of her staffers had to undergo FBI background checks. By the time everything was done, the cost to her and CSU approached $500,000.

"I cried," Leach said. "It made my life miserable for a while."

But what was frustrating then — and is just as confounding almost five years later — is that Leach doesn't know exactly why the bacterium she works with, whose scientific name is Xanthomonas oryzae pr. oryzae, was — and still is — listed as a select agent.

"I work on this in Colorado because we're 1,000 miles from any rice paddies," she said. "Fort Collins is a dry area where the winters are petty harsh — this is a tropical pathogen that couldn't survive outside. There's no host, no plant that it could survive on if it got outside."

A list of select agents published in October by the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service provides a hint about the concerns. It references an incident in the 1970s as part of the rationale but provides no details.

"APHIS analyzed and assessed this pathogen ... and (coupled with) the knowledge that Xanthomonas oryzae has been modified for use as a biological weapon in the past, it has been retained on the list," the agency wrote.

APHIS, which oversees the select agent program, would not speak to The Denver Post about specifics of the program or Leach's research.

Leach has been involved in rice research for three decades. The idea behind working with the bacterium is to help rice plants become resistant to it. That, in turn, helps maintain the yield, particularly in areas of the world that have limited access to pesticides that might help fight against disease.

But at the same time, there is the potential for someone to mutate the bacterium and use it to destroy large swaths of plants, which could affect the world's food supply.

In 2003, Gerald Fink, a biologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, chaired a National Research Council committee that published a report called "Biotechnology Research in an Age of Terrorism: Confronting the Dual Use Dilemma."

Dual-use research is legitimate biological study that could be co-opted to threaten public health or national security. The Fink Report contained seven recommendations to ensure responsible oversight for biotechnology research with potential bioterrorism applications.

One of the suggestions resulted in the formation in 2004 of the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, a 25-member panel that provides a link between the government and the scientific community in areas such as dual-use research.

"One of the reasons I agreed to serve on this board is that I really strongly believe that we ... need to have scientists look at (research) rather than just have a knee-jerk reaction of, 'Well, this could be dangerous, so let's stifle it,' " Leach said.

Right now, the list of select agents has about 60 entries, including such toxins as the avian influenza virus and African horse-sickness virus. When a toxin is under consideration for listing, the public has a chance to comment.

But Pamela Ronald, a University of California, Davis researcher who works with the same bacterium that Leach does, said the only way to have input is to write letters to APHIS, which doesn't respond.

"I don't know if they even read them," she said. "I've never been able to talk with anyone making the decisions. We don't even have a statement from the USDA as to why it's a select agent. It's a system that none of us understand."

Ronald said the move to retain Xanthomonas oryzae on the select-agent list is likely to drive her out of research. Complying with the government protocol is just too onerous, she says.

"There are 20 to 30 pages of detailed procedures, and you have to revise them every six months because new questions will come up," she said. "You have to do things like figure out if a mouse comes into your lab, how do you trap it and dispose of it? Six months later, they're not concerned about mice — now it's spiders. What's the protocol for that?"

The USA Rice Federation, a major player in the multibillion-dollar industry, was circumspect when talking about select agents and dual-use research.

"Safeguarding U.S. agriculture from potential biological threats is critically important to public safety and national security," said a spokeswoman for the group.

Courtesy of The Denver Post

Our devices are smart, but the basic design of batteries is unchanged from over a couple of hundred years ago: charged particles called ions following circuits between layers of chemical elements. The materials get better -- lithium-ion is an improvement over nickel-cadmium -- but the architecture of how they work is fundamentally the same. Any real breakthrough for an energy future less dependent on fossil fuels becomes much more likely if we can make a better battery.

That's why I wanted to talk with Amy Prieto.

"I'm a chemist; I'm a chemistry professor," she says. "But I've also started a company that's trying to design a new kind of rechargeable battery."

I saw her at her lab at Colorado State University in Ft. Collins, where she teaches, conducts research and leads the Prieto Battery Company, founded with CSU. She didn't know much about batteries when she started there a few years ago. And now she has a working prototype of what she calls a three-dimensional battery, with a core of copper foam.

"It's just like a sponge, you could think about," says Prieto. "Then we paint all the inside spaces with the different materials that you need for the battery. So the ions can go in many different directions, but they don't have to go very far. So, that's what I mean by a three-dimensional battery."

The battery project is in development, and she has achieved significant innovations already, though it will be years -- if ever -- before one is available for that phone you can't keep charged. But if she can get the architecture right, her battery could do a lot more than keep you talking all day. In a car, her battery could take you 300 miles, and then recharge in less than 10 minutes. That kind of performance would make a difference -- people would be more likely to embrace electric cars if they provide the kind of range and performance we're used to from the internal combustion engine.

Prof. Prieto has a ways to go...and a quiet confidence about her. It's a matter of time, she says.

"I think everybody wants better devices," says Prieto. "They want organic food. They want better treatment for diseases. But all of that takes fundamental research and that research takes quite a long time. I think communicating that sense of timing is very difficult. I'm not sure scientists necessarily do the best job of that."

Courtesy of American Public Media

That’s why we wanted to take the opportunity to highlight some of the rare next-generation battery startups out there that are using nanotechnology, new printing technologies, high-powered computing, and other innovations to produce the future’s batteries. With a little luck, strong leadership, and maybe some government support, these battery startups could change the way the world stores energy. Also make sure to check out an advanced battery report (subscription required) recently published by our research service GigaOM Pro.

1). Ambri: Ambri is one of the most well known battery startups out there. Formerly called Liquid Metal Battery, the company was founded by MIT Professor Don Sadoway, who is probably the only battery startup founder ever to score an interview on The Colbert Report. It’s also got investors Bill Gates, Vinod Khosla, and oil giant Total. Ambri is developing a battery for the power grid using molten salt sandwiched between two layers of liquid metal. The battery is still at least a year and a half from commercialization.

2). Imprint Energy: Using zinc, instead of lithium, and screen printing technology, Imprint Energy has developed a battery that is ultra-thin, energy-dense, flexible, and low cost. Because the battery can be made thin and pliable, the company hopes to target companies making wearables. Imprint Energy is already making small volumes of its batteries for pilot customers, and plans to ramp up to commercial scale manufacturing in a couple years.

3). Alveo Energy: Half-year-old startup Alveo Energy is looking to develop and commercialize a battery made out of water, Prussian blue dye — which is used to color things like blue jeans, crayons and paint — iron and copper. The battery is meant to be ultra low cost and long lasting, and if successful, could help deliver breakthrough energy storage technology for the power grid. The research behind the battery was done by Stanford PhD student turned entrepreneur Colin Wessells, and Stanford Professor Professor Robert Huggins, and the company managed to snag a $4 million grant from the Department of Energy’s high risk early stage program called ARPA-E.

4). Pellion: Pellion went about finding the perfect battery chemistry in a totally disruptive way: the researchers created advanced algorithms and computer models that enabled them to test out 10,000 potential cathode materials to fit with its magnesium anode for its battery. Pellion co-founder, MIT Professor Gerbrand Ceder, also helped develop The Materials Genome Project at MIT, which is a program based on using computer modelling and virtual simulations to deliver innovation in materials. Pellion says its magnesium batteries could have very high energy density — higher than current lithium ion batteries. The startup is backed by the ARPA-E program as well as Khosla Ventures.

5). QuantumScape: QuantumScape is an early stage stealth battery startup that is truly a product of Silicon Valley. The company is commercializing technology from Stanford University, it was founded by Infinera co-founder and CEO Jagdeep Singh, and it’s backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Khosla Ventures. The company is trying to create a battery — called the all-electron battery — that has the density of fossil fuels. The technology being used is a new method for stacking trace amounts of materials together.

6). Envia: A year ago battery startup Envia unveiled that its lithium ion battery technology could deliver an electric car with a 300-mile range for a cost of around $25,000 to $30,000. Founded in 2007, Envia developed a low-cost cathode and then paired that with a silicon carbon anode, and a high-voltage electroloyte. The company is backed by General Motors, Japanese giant Asahi Kasei, Pangaea Ventures, Redpoint Ventures and the DOE’s ARPA-E program.

7). GELI: Startup GELI isn’t making new types of batteries, but it’s developing an operating system and software for grid batteries. Companies, building owners and utilities can buy GELI-enabled batteries and use the batteries for services like providing energy storage for solar systems, or for storing and discharging energy when the demand for energy becomes out of balance with supply.

8). Sila Nanotechnologies: Sila Nanotechnologies was founded in 2011 by Valley entrepreneurs working with the Georgia Institute of Technology. The company is building a lighter lithium ion battery that has double the capacity of current lithium ion batteries. The company received a $1.73 million grant from the DOE.

9). Boulder Ionics: Boulder Ionics is working on breakthroughs for the electrolyte part of the battery, which is the guts of the battery, where the ions flow across between the anode and the cathode. The company is developing an electrolyte made of ionic liquids that can function at high temperatures and voltages and is lower cost to make than the more standard way to make ionic liquids.

10). Prieto Battery: The brainchild of Colorado State chemistry professor Amy Prieto, Prieto Battery is making a lithium ion battery that it says can charge in five minutes and last for five times longer than the standard lithium ion batteries. The company is leveraging nanotechnology to develop tiny copper nanowires that make up the anode of the battery, and the electrolyte is made of a solid polymer.

11). Sakti3: Sakti3 is a startup in Michigan that is building a lithium ion battery that is entirely solid state, and has a high energy density. Making it from solid polymers means it won’t have those flammable liquids and could be a lot safer for electric cars. The company is backed by Khosla Ventures, GM Ventures and Itochu.

12). Xilectric: Xilectric is re-making the “Edison Battery,” which traditionally has been a rechargeable nickel iron battery. But Xilectric is making it out of aluminum and magnesium, which it says will make it more low cost and with higher performance. The company was awarded a $1.73 million grant from the DOE.

13). Amprius: Based on research from Stanford’s Yi Cui, Amprius is working on lithium ion batteries that use a nanostructured silicon material for the anode. The nanostructured material could shrink the anode fourfold and allow a fourfold increase in energy density. The company has raised at least $25 million from Trident Capital, VantagePoint Venture Partners, IPV Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and Eric Schmidt.

Updated: This article was updated on January 14th at 10:30AM to correct the name of the show that Ambri’s founder did an interview on, from The Daily Show to The Colbert Report.

Courtesy of Gigaom

Then join CSU Ventures and your colleagues at the:

CSU Ventures Innovation Symposium- Friday April 12^th, 2013, 4pm-7pm

For over 50 years, CSU Ventures and CSU Research Foundation have been managing the technology transfer process at Colorado State University.  As an integral partner in the innovation process, CSU Ventures is pleased to announce our CSU Ventures Innovation Symposium. 

The CSUV Innovation Symposium includes:

• A poster session highlighting innovative and cutting edge CSU research
• Talks and roundtable discussions on the innovative nature of Northern Colorado
• A chance to hang out with like-minded individuals from departments across campus
• An opportunity to sample various beers courtesy of Odell Brewing

Event Speakers:

• CSU Researchers and Technology Transfer Professionals
  • Ken Reardon, PhD- Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering
  • Melissa Reynolds, PhD- Department of Chemistry
  • Amy Prieto, PhD- Department of Chemistry
  • Greg Graff, PhD- Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics
  • Todd Headley, President- CSU Ventures
  • Mike Freeman, CEO- Rocky Mountain Innosphere

Date and Location:

• Friday, April 12^th, 2013. 4pm-7pm
• Rocky Mountain Innosphere, Northern Colorado’s premiere science and technology business incubator, 320 East Vine Drive, Fort Collins, CO

Posters and RSVP:

• Interested in presenting your research? If your research is innovative and has commercial potential, please submit an abstract (max 500 words) to steve.foster@colostate.edu by March 15^th.
•                         Please RSVP by March 29^th.  Attendance is limited and an RSVP is required.
  • CSU Ventures website: www.csuventures.org
  • http://events.constantcontact.com/register/event?llr=m8koigcab&oeidk=a07e72rnj944b70304c

Thanks to a $1.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health, Ron Tjalkens, associate professor at Colorado State University, will spend the next five years investigating such environmental influences as manganese on brain degeneration.

Tjalkens, who is in the Department of Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences in the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at CSU, is one of a growing number of investigators examining the non-neuronal cells of the brain known as glial cells, which support the basic functions of neurons. Glial cells also appear to create the inflammatory response in brain cells that can lead to neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s.

Tjalkens compared it to chronic arthritis, but in the brain.

“Glial cells are the least understood aspect of neurological disease,” Tjalkens said. “With stroke, spinal cord injuries, whenever you stress or injure neurons, all the surrounding support cells known as glial cells start to acquire a long-term inflammatory state where they activate and produce substances that further damage the neurons.

“They’re functionally coupled to neurons – they provide life support and aid in neurotransmission and blood flow and many other things,” he added. “The overarching question is what’s responsible for triggering this neuroinflammation that is involved in the progression of these neurological diseases. What are the fundamental signaling pathways that are responsible? Once you understand the fundamental pathways responsible for neuroinflammation, you know the targets to go after.”

Tjalkens also received a separate $120,000 grant from the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, the largest privately funded source of Parkinson’s research grants, to investigate compounds that could halt progression of the disease. Current Parkinson’s treatments only control the symptoms, while neuroprotective compounds could stop the degeneration of neurons in the brain and effectively halt the disease.

Scientists have already determined that age, genetic predisposition or environmental influences - not inherited genetic defects - are involved in most cases of Parkinson’s disease. Genetic predisposition means that many subtle changes in a person's genome can contribute to their sensitivity to disease. Inherited genetic defects are those inherited single gene mutations that can directly cause disease.

“Low-level exposures could increase your susceptibility to disease later in life,” Tjalkens said. “We’re understanding now that it’s this cocktail of genetics, environment and age that gives many diseases.”

Manganese, for example, has been garnering significant attention for its effect on children, who absorb it more readily into their brains. That could be a factor on whether children are more susceptible to neurological disease later in life – especially when 6 percent of drinking water wells in the nation have higher than accepted levels of manganese, Tjalkens said.

Thursday, March 7, 2013

US Olympic Training Center Presidential
Conference Room
1750 E Boulder Avenue Colorado Springs, CO 80909

11:30am-Registration & Boxed Lunch

Noon - 1:00pm-America Invents Act:
What You Need To Know
Craig Mueller, Shareholder with Sheridan Ross P.C. and
Ian Walsworth, Associate with Sheridan Ross P.C. will provide an update on the changes in the America Invents Act and their affect on current patent prosecution and litigation.

Main topics to be addressed in the patent prosecution section include:

*First Inventor to file
*Grace periods
*Fast-tracking applications
*Prosecution by assignee
*Changes in post-grant proceedings

Main topics to be addressed in the Impacts on Litigation section include:
*Patent Office litigation proceedings
*Codification of Prior Use Defense
*New Joinder/Consolidation Requirements
*Limits placed on false marking claims and business method patents

We hope that you can join us for this informative discussion.

Register here

PURPOSE OF THE RFP

The Cancer Supercluster (CaSC) is a specially sanctioned interdisciplinary alliance to focus key research initiatives in cancer. Colorado State University has demonstrated globally competitive expertise and potential for external funding in cancer research. The goal of the Cancer Supercluster is to speed research to the global marketplace – making those great ideas from the university available to improve the lives of all species. For 2013, special emphasis for grants is placed on clinical trials and linkage to the University of Colorado.  Proposals for innovative basic research projects will also be accepted as well as capacity building needs.

SUBMITTING A PROPOSAL

Please review the RFP and associated documents below for additional information. The Letter of Intent and completed full proposals must be submitted electronically per the instructions to steve.foster@colostate.edu.  Questions may be addressed via email or phone (970-297-1276).

• CaSC 2013 RFP
• CaSC 2013 Letter of Intent
• CaSC 2013 RFP Application

The gift to Colorado State and the Colorado FFA Foundation is among the first to benefit students at agricultural colleges and land-grant universities nationwide as part of Denver-based CoBank’s new $5 million agricultural research and education funding initiative, announced earlier this week.

Other partners supporting the Center for Agricultural Education are American AgCredit of Greeley, Farm Credit of Southern Colorado in Colorado Springs and Premier Farm Credit of Sterling. All are members of the Farm Credit System, a nationwide network of lending institutions specifically chartered to serve agriculture and rural America.

Leaders of the Colorado FFA Foundation, CSU College of Agricultural Sciences and the donor partnership will unveil details of the gift and its impact during the Colorado Agriculture Hall of Fame Celebration, beginning at 4:15 p.m. today at the Renaissance Hotel Denver.

“CSU has a distinguished history as a center of knowledge, research and education in agricultural sciences,” said Robert B. Engel, president and chief executive officer of CoBank. “We are delighted to be joining with American AgCredit, Farm Credit of Southern Colorado and Premier Farm Credit in support of this exciting initiative, which will deliver meaningful, long-term benefits to agriculture and Colorado’s rural economy.”

The Center for Agricultural Education will be constructed at the CSU research farm north of Fort Collins when the university and Colorado FFA Foundation have fulfilled a $3 million fund-raising goal. The campaign already has generated more than $2 million in donations from companies, industry associations and individuals who understand the vital role of agriculture in the economy and society, said Dale McCall, chairman of the Colorado FFA Foundation board of directors. The foundation has helped spearhead project planning and fund-raising.

“The gift from CoBank and its Farm Credit partners will provide an opportunity for students at CSU to be fully trained and effective when they go out to be agricultural-education teachers and FFA advisors in schools throughout our region,” McCall said. “This wonderful gift allows us to get closer and closer to our goal of a center that will influence students for generations.”

The significant gift will support students in CSU’s quickly growing Agricultural Education Program, which prepares college students to lead high-school agriculture and FFA programs – and to enter other sectors of agriculture that require leadership skills and broad knowledge of an industry working intently to address global food security. The CSU Agricultural Education Program now has about 40 undergraduate students enrolled, with an additional 12 pursuing agricultural education at the graduate level.

“Premier Farm Credit is honored to participate in this important endeavor to improve and expand the educational experience for those who will themselves become agricultural educators,” said Rick Sanger, president and chief executive officer, Premier Farm Credit. “These teachers play a key role in developing the next generation of farmers, ranchers and other ag professionals, and we are proud to support their efforts to ensure a bright future for agriculture.”

“Farm Credit of Southern Colorado is very pleased to be part of this collaboration to enhance agricultural education in Colorado,” added Russ Tomky, president and chief executive officer, Farm Credit of Southern Colorado.

The Center for Agricultural Education will encompass more than 18,000 square feet, with customized laboratory, technology, teaching and office space. It also will include special exhibit space for the Colorado Agriculture Hall of Fame, a signature program of the Colorado FFA Foundation. In this way, the center will be not only an agricultural training facility, but a gathering place for people dedicated to agriculture and rural communities.

“The CoBank Center for Agricultural Education and the Farm Credit Colorado Agriculture Hall of Fame will represent the best of Colorado’s agricultural past, present and future,” said Ron Carli, chief executive officer, American AgCredit. “As the nation’s single-largest source of credit to rural America, the Farm Credit System shares the same rich history and passion for preparing the next generation of agricultural educators. Their dedication and influence will help meet the challenge of feeding our nation and the world.”

Graduates of the CSU Agricultural Education Program, housed in the College of Agricultural Sciences, have been in high demand and nearly all the program’s students have been employed upon graduation because they are prepared to mentor high-school students and to fulfill other leadership roles, said Kellie Enns, assistant professor and program leader.

Leadership in agriculture is more essential now than ever before, noted Craig Beyrouty, dean of the CSU College of Agricultural Sciences. That’s because agriculture is challenged to meet the food demands of a global population expected to top 9 billion people in the next few decades, while solving pressing environmental problems and improving quality of life for people near and far.
These grand challenges require innovations – and the critical ability of people in U.S. agriculture to connect with others in an increasingly urban society.

“This gift is a testament to the partners’ commitment to agriculture, our rural communities, and the development of students who will play key leadership roles in the future. It’s huge,” Beyrouty said. “The Center for Agricultural Education will be a state-of-the-art facility that will advance our program and agricultural education throughout the region.”

The Advanced Industries Accelerator Act, which has bipartisan support, would allow the state to channel funds directly to early-stage companies commercializing new technologies and concepts.

Such firms typically lack the profits necessary to allow them to take advantage of the tax credits that dominate the state's current menu of incentives.

"It will help make the state more competitive in world markets," Gov. John Hickenlooper said at a news conference Monday morning.

The seven industries that the act will target are aerospace, advanced manufacturing, bioscience, electronics, energy and natural resources, technology and information, and infrastructure engineering.

Those industries account for about 30 percent of the state's economy, provide 520,300 high-paying jobs and spin off hundreds of thousands of auxiliary jobs, Hickenlooper said.

House Speaker-elect Mark Ferrandino said he is trying to find $15 million in funding for the program.

Some of that will come from funds slated to go to the biosciences and clean-energy technology program passed in 2011. That program diverts 50 percent of the taxes paid by firms in those industries into an investment fund.

Attempts will be made to secure additional funds freed up by planned reforms to the state's enterprise-zone program and from the general fund, Ferrandino said.

The bulk of the tax credits under the enterprise-zone program go to large firms that make major capital investments. Critics say the approach doesn't always reward job creation and can leave promising startups underfunded.

But picking the right companies to fund could prove challenging, said Kevin Johansen, chief executive of the Business Catapult.

"If the state's going to do this right, they'd be smart to get some active angel investors involved in the screening. Not bureaucrats. Not academics," he said.

The proposed bill provides for three types of grants.

A proof-of-concept grant would provide up to $150,000 to fund research at Colorado institutions, which would be required to provide a $1 match for every $3 the state provides.

An early-stage capital and retention grant would provide up to $250,000 to companies with half or more of their employees based in the state.

An infrastructure-funding grant, which would provide up to $500,000, would make funds available for research- and-development, production and commercialization facilities.

The last two grants would require private enterprise to provide $2 in investment for each $1 the state provides.

The proposed program would be managed through the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade.

Aldo Svaldi: 303-954-1410, asvaldi@denverpost.com or twitter.com/aldosvaldi

Courtesy of The Denver Post

Kendall has served as interim director for the past year and also serves as an assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology within the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.

“Dr. Kendall has done a fantastic job for us in this critical unit, which provides care for a diverse set of species and research programs located on three different CSU campuses,” said Farland, whose office oversees Laboratory Animal Resources. “He takes pride in identifying methods to streamline processes while being fiscally responsible so resources remain focused on research as well as operations. At the same time, he is committed to uphold and advance CSU’s reputation as a leader in research animal welfare.”

Campuswide animal facilities

Kendall oversees animal facilities that serve investigators with programs in infectious disease, oncology, reproductive biology, exercise physiology, agricultural sciences and other disciplines.

His office also makes a 10-12 week summer internship program available for first- or second-year veterinary students as funds allow. The program provides students with exposure to practical and clinical laboratory animal medicine and biomedical research and assigns students to a summer research project in an aspect of laboratory animal/comparative medicine. As director, he will work with Dr. Sue VandeWoude, who oversees the residency training program in laboratory animal/comparative medicine at CSU.

Kendall graduated with his DVM from CSU in 1994 and completed his residency in Laboratory Animal Medicine and his PhD in Veterinary Pathobiology in 2000 at the University of Missouri. Upon completing his degree, he took a position at the University of California-Davis where he served as an associate professor and veterinarian for the Comparative Pathology Laboratory, and eventually as director for the Center for Laboratory Animal Science and Campus Veterinarian overseeing the animal care program.

He is an active member of the American College of Laboratory Animal Medicine, the American Society of Laboratory Animal Practitioners, and the American Association for Laboratory Animal Science,. The Lon V. Kendall Sacramento Valley AALAS Member of the Year Award was created in his honor in 2008.

Go to Laboratory Animal Resources for more information.

Inspiration struck 20 years ago after the engineer had a dream that led to the idea of developing a hybrid of a natural material and synthetic polymer that would look like cartilage to the body and not be rejected like other artificial materials.

“I literally woke up in the middle of the night and thought, ‘yeah, we should try that,’” James said.

James, now the department head of Mechanical Engineering at CSU and a professor in the school of biomedical engineering, began a line of research that led to the creation of a biologically enhanced, long-lasting knee implant.

“The ‘aha’ idea was really just a precursor to what was developed,” James said.

Infused with a biological molecule and natural lubricant (hyaluronic acid) the material, BioPoly, has been licensed to a private company for use as a less invasive alternative to knee replacement.

After eight years from the initial filing, the invention received its patent license in 2010.

BioPoly was one of 56 inventions originating at the university that were patented with the help of CSU Ventures from 2006 to 2011.

CSU Ventures –– the university organization charged with promoting, patenting, licensing and protecting inventions created at CSU –– has seen across the board, record high numbers for technology transfer during that same time period.

A rundown of 2007 to 2011:

-515 inventions — up 132 percent from the 222 inventions during the previous five-year period
-627 patent applications — a 170 percent increase from the 232 applications during the previous five-year period
-165 license agreements — a 184 percent increase from 58 agreements during the previous five-year period
-$8.22 million in licensing income — an 86 percent increase from $4.42 million during the previous five-year period

Todd Headley, president of CSU Ventures, said the mission of the private, non-profit organization is to make sure that research and innovation done at the university makes it to companies who can commercialize the technology.

He attributed the success to campus officials investing in the infrastructure needed to get inventions into the marketplace, an increase of “boots on the ground” at the university and word of mouth — both in the marketplace and among researchers and faculty at CSU.

An influx of money for research at CSU didn’t hurt, either. The campus has seen an increase in research funding per year over the last five years, culminating with a record $340 million in 2012.

“There’s definitely a correlation,” Headley said.

BioPoly is one of nine inventions James has patented during her 19 years as a faculty member. She said technology transfer at the university has come a long way since the late 1990s.

“They’ve added a lot of staff and gotten a lot smarter about how it all works,” James said. “In the early days I certainly didn’t feel like they were really on top of their game.”

Headley said he’s optimistic the next five years will see continued, if slightly slower, growth.

“It’s probably not going to be as dramatic because we really did come a long way in the last five years,” he said.

Melissa Reynolds, a professor in Chemistry and the School of Biomedical Engineering, has two inventions making their way through the patent process and a startup company, Diazamed, that’s licensed to use the technology.

CSU Ventures helped with getting her company up and running and guiding the inventions through the complicated patent process.

Reynolds said she worked in private industry before coming to CSU in 2009 and one of the major reasons she decided to come to CSU was the “user friendly” nature of technology transfer at the university.

“The notion of being able to go in and talk to someone here and figure out the best way to get technology patented is very exciting,” Reynolds said.

Both her inventions involve making molecular coating for medical devices. One, designed to degrade in the body over time, leaves no leftover polymers or plastics in the body. The other is meant to last in the body forever.

Reynolds has received multiple grants and awards to continue research in this area, including a $1.3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense.

Cardiovascular devices like stent coatings, artificial blood vessels and wound-healing devices that could be used by injured soldiers in combat are a few applications her inventions can be used for.

Both James and Reynolds said the most rewarding part of the research process is working with students in cutting edge research and creating products that can improve people’s lives.

“I don’t think there can be anything more rewarding,” Reynolds said. “Graduate and undergraduate students, they’re the ones that actually make the discoveries and create the innovation that we can then convert into products so they’re part of that process.”

Senior Reporter Austin Briggs can be reached at news@collegian.com.

Courtesy of The Rocky Mountain Collegian

The donation will be invested, and annual earnings from the endowment will provide a steady flow of research funding for many years to come.

A group of Colorado industry associations jointly provided the gift. The group has annually funded research for nearly four decades; the endowment will allow a continuation of this support in perpetuity.

The funding will continue to bolster research of special interest to the green industry, said Stephen Wallner, head of the Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture.

“This research support is a nice example of partnerships our department and land-grant university have with Colorado agriculture. Our department is pleased to support industry needs with new discoveries, which ultimately help not only producers, but also home and public gardeners,” Wallner said. “We particularly appreciate this dependable research funding, which will continue in perpetuity.”

Donna Ralston, former executive director of the GreenCo Foundation and a leader in providing the donation, said the green industry is especially interested in research that suggests solutions to water scarcity for lawns and gardens.

“Most of the issues in the industry revolve around water conservation, water use and plants that are more drought-tolerant in our semi-arid climate. We’re interested in understanding everything from plant varieties to better irrigation techniques,” Ralston said. “Our industry continues to evolve, and research findings are critical to that.”

The green industry is a critical component of Colorado agriculture.

Total revenues for the green industry were estimated to be about $1.8 billion dollars in 2007, according to the most recent economic survey. The green industry provided almost 35,000 jobs with $1.2 billion dollars in payroll, the survey showed.

The industry encompasses the following sectors: landscape architecture, landscape contracting, nurseries and greenhouses, garden centers, sod production, lawn care professionals, and tree and shrub care.

“By donating these assets to an endowment established through the CSU Foundation, we can continue to support horticulture research that benefits the entire green industry for years to come,” said Troy Sibelius, former president of the GreenCo Foundation.

In the early 1900s, people suffering from TB often went to Colorado looking for relief from the infection. In the last 20 years, it has become a home for TB researchers seeking a cure for the illness. The MRL, part of Colorado State University, has several state-of-the-art facilities in the state.

As HIV spreads around the world, TB rates have increased along with it. In addition, rising numbers of multidrug-resistant TB cases are being reported. TB is caused by bacteria that are generally associated with the lungs, but can attack other parts of the body as well. Estimates are that more than one-third of the world’s population has been exposed to TB.

Dr. Patrick Brennan laid the groundwork for the MRL nearly 25 years ago as a facility to study TB and leprosy. Today, the MRL has a staff of 168 and primarily researches treatments for TB. Brennan built the facility by consistently seeking the best researchers in the field.

In the mid-1980’s, the AIDS epidemic created a troubling resurgence in TB cases. For years, there was little funding for new TB research, but the situation changed dramatically. CSU’s labs were in a good position to build on recent developments.

“Those were interesting times,” Dr. Ian Orme said. “We recruited some people, but others just came out of the woodwork to come here. Before we knew it, there were 100 people working here.”

Over the years, the NIH and, more recently, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, donated nearly $100 million towards MRL’s research, which included testing bedaquiline, the first new TB drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in nearly 40 years.

“The action by the FDA follows the results of new clinical trials of bedaquiline that have recently shown that the drug significantly reduces the duration of treatment of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis in patients, thus confirming the results of our studies performed at CSU,” Orme said.

Courtesy of Vaccine News Daily

They’re all faculty members who share the prestigious Boettcher Investigator title - one of the most prestigious research funding sources in Colorado that helps recruit, retain and advance scientific talent in the state.

Supporting early career research

The Boettcher Foundation has committed to awarding close to $1 million to four Colorado State University scholars over the next three years. The program is intended to support early career biomedical investigators in their transition to independent research.

In this round of competition, each investigator would receive $225,000 over a three-year period. Two researchers will be selected in 2013 and one each in 2014 and 2015.

“The Boettcher Foundation Board of Trustees has been pleased with the outcomes of our Webb-Waring Biomedical Research Program during its first three years of existence, and they have approved another allocation for 2013 through 2015,” said Bill Farland, vice president for Research at CSU.

Nominations are now being accepted by Farland’s office, which will manage the competition and peer-review process. Application inquiries must be sent to Linda Foster at Linda.Foster@colostate.edu or 492-4038 and not to the Boettcher Foundation. Go to the Vice President for Research website for application materials.

The first class of Webb-Waring Early Career Investigators, announced in 2010, included Melissa Reynolds, an assistant professor of chemistry. In 2011, Boettcher named John D. (Nick) Fisk and Tingting Yao, assistant professors at CSU, in the second class. Fisk is a chemical and biological engineering professor and Yao is a biochemistry professor.

“The resources provided by the Boettcher Award has allowed me to pursue a new line of research that was difficult to obtain funding for initially,” Yao said. “The prestige associated with the award also contributed positively to recognition by colleagues in my field and my ability to obtain funding from Federal agencies including NIH and NSF.”

A prestigious, career-making award

Reynolds, who was the first recipient at Colorado State said the Boettcher program helped her in numerous ways. In addition to accelerating research efforts in her lab by supporting students to make scientific discoveries, the award connected her with other investigators within the state.

“Because of this ‘Boettcher family’ formed from bringing together investigators, Keith Neeves' group and mine have a joint project that has resulted in several publications and presentations by our students,” Reynolds said. “The Boettcher funding has also provided networking opportunities between academic and industrial research that would not have otherwise been possible. This networking has promoted bioscience (CBSA) and industrial contacts within the state of Colorado thereby increasing the visibility of bioscience technology within the state.

“Being a Boettcher Investigator has also fostered scholarly relationships with outstanding undergraduate students who are interested in becoming actively involved in research. For example, Lucus Suazo, a Boettcher Scholar, is doing cutting edge research in the area of anti-microbial devices - an educational opportunity that may not have been possible without the Boettcher support.”

Courtesy of Today at Colorado State

Cultivating Innovation

The public forum, called “Cultivating Innovation: Creating Ideas for our Future,” will run 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Feb. 14 at the Denver Renaissance Hotel and will include a number of timely talks and breakout sessions. Cost is $100 per person, including continental breakfast and lunch; registration deadline is Feb. 4 and is available online at the website.

The annual forum is co-hosted by the Colorado Department of Agriculture and Colorado State University.

$40 billion and 173,000 people

Each year, the Governor’s Forum on Colorado Agriculture addresses an important theme of the day, focused through the lens of Colorado agriculture, which contributes an estimated $40 billion each year to the state economy and employs an estimated 173,000 people.

“Innovation is a key to our future in agriculture as we consider the challenges ahead, and all of us, from producers to policy-makers, play a part in advancing innovation,” said Commissioner of Agriculture John Salazar.

Innovation is essential

A renewed national commitment to innovation in agriculture is essential to meeting U.S. and global food and security needs, according to a December 2012 report from the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

Such calls for agricultural innovation come as farmers and ranchers are challenged to double food production by 2050 in order to feed a world population expected to top 9 billion people – while also conserving environmental resources and improving food safety.

Speakers

Speakers during the morning session of the 2013 Governor’s Forum on Colorado Agriculture include:

• Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper;
• Colorado Commissioner of Agriculture John Salazar;
• Colorado State University President Tony Frank;
• Ajay Menon, Colorado’s chief innovation officer and dean of the CSU College of Business;
• Michael Raynor, director of Deloitte Consulting and author of best-selling books including “The Innovator’s Solution” and “The Innovator’s Manifesto”; and
• Leann Saunders, president of IMI Global, Inc., an agricultural verification solutions company and founder of the Where Food Comes From® food labeling program; she also is vice chair of the U.S. Meat Export Federation and leads the federation’s Traceability Working Group.

“We are pleased to present speakers who will help us understand the urgent need for innovation in agriculture and will provide us with specific examples that are helping our industry. Their experiences and insights will undoubtedly spark great ideas among people attending,” said Craig Beyrouty, dean of the CSU College of Agricultural Sciences.

Breakout sessions

Afternoon breakout sessions will include a presentation about the devastating 2012 drought, led by CSU agricultural economist James Pritchett. At a separate session, Diane Mulligan, president of Mulligan & Co. of Denver and a specialist in strategic communication, will discuss the changing face of communications.

Reception

The forum will be preceded by a reception from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Feb. 13 at the Governor's Residence at Boettcher Mansion.

The Governor’s Forum on Colorado Agriculture is held in conjunction with the Colorado FFA Foundation’s Agriculture Hall of Fame Banquet. The banquet will be the evening of Feb. 14, also at the Denver Renaissance Hotel. For information about the 2013 Agriculture Hall of Fame inductees, and to register for the banquet, visit the website.

Courtesy of Today at Colorado State

Florin, of equity firm Florin, LTD, said he turned what could become the next Facebook or Twitter away from Fort Collins due to a lack of investors and venture capital here. But Florin and a group of Northern Colorado investors hope to change that with a new organization called Colorado Angel Investors, Inc.

The group of 12 accredited investors seeks to fund local startup companies to the tune of $100,000 to $500,000. The angel investors, who held their first meeting last week, look to grow by reaching 50 investors willing to put in between $25,000 to $50,000 each year to help Northern Colorado startups reach production.

The group also will provide guidance, expertise and advice for young entrepreneurs.

Founding member Mark Kent, executive in residence at Access Venture Partners, said the angels will be able to open doors and provide connections that entrepreneurs couldn’t otherwise access.

“An angel investor club is like a management team,” Kent said. “It’s a little lonely trying to do by yourself, angel investing.”

The group is similar to the television show “Shark Tank” that depicts celebrities battling to invest in startup companies. Florin said the group will be like “Shark Tank” without the teeth because the group will collaborate on deals.

“This is very high-risk equity if you don’t have the stomach to lose all of it, Florin said. “... we may make a return on one out of 10 investments.”

Skin in the game

The Colorado Angel Investors founders met as board members of the Rocky Mountain Innosphere, a tech incubator in Fort Collins.

In addition to Kent and Florin, two capital firm leaders — Vista Ventures general partner Dave Dwyer and Pasadena Angels founder DuWayne Peterson — helped launch the group.

This isn’t the first time an angels group has tried to form here. In 2008, Florin was part of the effort to start NoCo Angels, which fell apart during the recession.

While the group will invest together, each member will contribute money from their personal portfolio. Kent noted many angels are looking for a place to get a return on their money other than a bank or the stock market after feeling the sting of the recession.

Kent and Florin noted that the group isn’t a charity, and members expect a return on their investments. The group will carefully vet each venture and may pass on several companies before they find one worth investing in.

“Investing in a company is different from advising,” Kent said. “When you have skin in the game you can have everyday phone calls with the entrepreneur.”

The group plans to mine sources like the Innosphere for companies to invest in.

Outside of a couple existing angel groups in the state, angel investors are extremely fragmented and can be hard to find, said Innosphere CEO Mike Freeman. The formation of the local group provides an avenue for local startups looking for funding.

“(Clients) know they will have the ability to pitch when they are ready, and that is huge for us,” Freeman said. “We have to have a viable, active angel group to be a success.”

Filling a void

CSU undergrad Jasser Mohamed has dreams of one day changing the world with his startup called IDEAS-Bioenergy.

Mohamed, originally from Sudan, has plans to use algae to convert carbon dioxide emissions to biofuel.

IDEAS-Bioenergy would use a system of vertical pipes filled with algae to convert the fuel. Mohamed would like to put the system on a truck so it could be shown around the country. He has dreams of the venture eventually going global.

As he works on honing his prototype and raising capital, Mohamed said a Northern Colorado angel investor group could help him a lot. Currently self-funded, Mohamed said finding investors is crucial to getting IDEAS-Bioenergy off the ground.

“I’m smart, but I’d be a lot smarter with a lot of other smart people around me,” he said.

Steven Roy, president and CEO of Fort Collins startup VetDC, offers an example of how angel investors can help a company.

VetDC is designing a new drug to treat cancer in companion animals, primarily dogs and cats. The project received $1.5 million private financing, aided by Kent and Florin.

“The landscape for angel investors in still evolving and the key is trying to bring investors together and have a good company to put in front of them,” Roy said. “Finding vehicles to bring Northern Colorado investors together and align with the Rocky Investor Club or Rocky Mountain Innosphere, there is a wealth of companies needing money and then a matter of getting money from people looking to make investments.”

Charisse Bowen, director for the CSU Institute for Entrepreneurship, said she was pleased to hear the angel group was forming.

“I definitively think it is an important part of the entrepreneurial ecosystem which we have been missing before,” she said. “To have a group of individuals to present ready business ideas to on a local level puts us at a real advantage.”

 Courtesy of the Coloradoan

Since its launch in 2007, the collaboratory has focused its research efforts in biofuels and biorefining, photovoltaic energy generation, and wind power. The collaboratory institutions are now adding carbon management and energy-systems integration to their shared research portfolio.

“We’ve been very successful in our biofuels, solar and wind programs over the past five years, both in advancing these technologies and helping to attract companies in these fields to Colorado,” explained Dana Christensen, NREL deputy lab director and collaboratory board member. “But our vision has always been broader than helping these renewable energy technologies to mature. We want Colorado to continue to lead in creating a reliable, cost-effective, clean and safe energy system for the U.S. and for the world.”

The collaboratory’s broadened focus aims to help industry find new ways to produce fuels and electricity in systems that facilitate the integration of carbon management and energy systems. Newly available reserves of natural gas can fuel new electric power plants that are cheaper to build and cheaper to operate than older coal plants. Additionally, modern gas-fired plants can also be powered up and down in response to the need for electricity.

“The fact that our Colorado collaboratory is taking on carbon-management systems and energy-systems integration in addition to its focus on renewable energy technology is a good sign for the citizens of Colorado and the nation,” said CU-Boulder Vice Chancellor for Research Stein Sture. “The University of Colorado Boulder and our partners in this venture continue to move forward in honing new cutting-edge energy technologies, which is a huge benefit to our students who are training with some of the world’s experts to help solve pressing 21st century energy challenges.”

The collaboratory will also work to expand understanding and management of the impacts of increasing use of natural gas and electricity in vehicles. Researchers will develop systems to help manage the integration of coal and gas-generated electricity with wind, sun and geothermal-generated electricity.

“Colorado State University is extremely proud of the unique scientific collaboration occurring in energy among the three major research universities and federal laboratories in Colorado,” said Bill Farland, vice president for research at CSU. “Our land-grant mission of research, teaching and outreach supports the evolution of this collaboration into emerging areas that are important to the country, and to industry as well as to students preparing to enter the workforce.”

Also, the collaboratory’s new Carbon Management Center will work to reduce the direct and indirect emissions of carbon dioxide and other global warming gases. The center will explore the potential for truly clean coal, whether through carbon capture and sequestration technologies or in situ gasification -- where underground coal is converted to gaseous fuel -- while carbon and other pollutants remain underground.

“The new Carbon Management Center is focused on some of the most challenging scientific and engineering endeavors the world faces,” said Colorado School of Mines Vice President of Research John Poate. “The collaboratory’s focus on broader energy solutions reflects the comprehensive strengths of Colorado School of Mines and our belief that solving the world’s energy challenges requires the development of innovative ideas and technologies across all disciplines.”

“We can boost Colorado’s advanced industries by increasing their access to capital,” Hickenlooper said. “These types of bipartisan efforts will help Colorado continue to grow and sustain a long-term innovative ecosystem that creates highly-skilled jobs and prepares Coloradans to fill them.”

Advanced industries are comprised of engineering and R&D-intensive companies that deliver groundbreaking, innovative products. They share common workforce skills in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), as well as manufacturing. The economic impact of these industries is significant, accounting for 30 percent of the state’s economy, 520,300 high-paying jobs, and hundreds of thousands of ancillary jobs.

Colorado has identified seven advanced industries in the state: aerospace, advanced manufacturing, bioscience, electronics, energy & natural resources, technology & information and infrastructure engineering.

“This bipartisan legislation marks a major investment in Colorado’s long-term economic prosperity,” Ferrandino said. “It sends a clear message to Colorado’s innovators that we are there for them over the long haul, and to leaders everywhere that Colorado can compete with anyone for any industry.”

HB 1001, sponsored by Reps Dave Young (D-Greeley) and Cheri Gerou (R-Evergreen) and Sens. Rollie Heath (D-Boulder) and Pat Steadman (D-Denver), provides for an incentive that encourages more collaboration between industry, research institutions and federal laboratories, and private-sector funders. It will create a program that will provide grants to those advanced industries that are seeking funding for proof of concept research and development, early stage capital and retention, and infrastructure.

The program will be managed out of the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade (OEDIT), which will work with research institutions, industry partners and the Economic Development Commission to qualify companies and disburse funds.

“The funding that Colorado’s advanced industries will receive through these new grants will help convert ideas into real jobs, enable us to keep and grow companies we help create, and build a foundation to help companies succeed,” said Ken Lund, executive director of OEDIT. “Colorado has a vast network of assets including world class research institutions and federal labs, universities, innovative companies, and a highly educated workforce. Aligning, leveraging and integrating these assets around opportunities to grow the advanced industries will establish Colorado as a global competitor and technology hub, and turn Colorado’s basic research strengths into viable companies that remain here.”

How HB 1001 will help the Colorado economy:

• Colorado’s research institutions and federal labs currently bring in close to $2 billion annually in advanced technology related research funds. Additional investment in the advanced industries will help leverage even more dollars into the state, which will translate into more products and jobs.
• HB 1001 will accelerate the commercialization process, enabling Colorado companies and products to spin-out of Colorado research institutions and significantly reduce the time-to-market cycle.
• Setting aside a minimum amount of early-stage matching funds will help Colorado-based technology companies attract private investment.
• Funding will be directed at strategic points in a company's capital cycle, which will help retain assets and investments in Colorado and create stronger ties to Colorado for future growth.

Eligibility Requirements for Grants:
Proof-of-Concept Grants

• Research performed at Colorado research institutions
• Grant size limited to $150,000
• Preference given to those projects that focus on technologies that cut across multiple advanced industries and across multiple research institutions. Such collaborative projects may qualify for funding in excess of $150,000
• Matching funds shall be 3 (state) to 1 (institution)

Early Stage Capital & Retention Grants

• At least 50 percent of employees based in Colorado
• Grant size limited to $250,000
• Preference given to companies that provide services or products across multiple advanced industries. Such companies may qualify for funding in excess of $250,000
• Matching funds shall be 1 (state) to 2 (private)

Infrastructure Funding

• Grant size limited to $500,000
• Preference given to those projects that focus on technology or product development that cut across multiple advanced industries and across multiple research institutions. Such collaborative projects may qualify for funding in excess of $500,000
• Matching funds shall be 1 (state) to 2 (private)
• Preference for research and development, production and commercialization facilities
• Preference for workforce development through centers of excellences tied to advanced industries’ workforce needs

Some funding sources for HB 1001 have been identified, and the Governor’s Office will work with the General Assembly on the funding details.

Courtesy of Coloado: The Official State Web Portal

Johnson & Johnson recently announced that the drug bedaquiline had obtained initial approval for the treatment of multi-drug resistant tuberculosis – a rapidly growing and dangerous strain of tuberculosis that now afflicts more than 650,000 people around the world.

Bedaquiline was discovered by the Johnson and Johnson Company in Belgium in 2005. In 2007, a research team led by Anne Lenaerts and Ian Orme at CSU published a paper with collaborators at J&J revealing that the drug showed fast-acting, highly effective treatment of tuberculosis. Colorado State is known internationally for its tuberculosis research programs, which includes work on developing and testing drugs and vaccines against the disease.

The university’s tuberculosis researchers – the largest group in the nation – have attracted more than $93 million in funding since 1981. For more information, videos and photos go to http://www.colostate.edu/tuberculosisresearch/.

“The drug was very potent in these models, clearing infections even at relatively low drug concentrations with superior activity when compared to a conventional three-drug regimen,” said Orme, a University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology at CSU. “In addition, in more recent work we were able to show that adding bedaquiline to other drugs significantly reduced the time needed to treat infections in experimental rodent models.

“The action by the FDA follows the results of new clinical trials of bedaquiline that have recently shown that the drug significantly reduces the duration of treatment of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis in patients, thus confirming the results of our studies performed at CSU,” Orme said. “This new drug by Johnson and Johnson is a huge breakthrough and is likely to be very promising in treating people around the world with MDR TB, including the United States, who face this very real threat.”

Lenaerts and Orme are members of the university’s Mycobacteria Research Laboratories, which includes the Rocky Mountain Regional Biocontainment Laboratory – one of the most secure laboratories of its kind in the world where researchers can work with drug-resistant tuberculosis and other infectious diseases. Orme co-founded the Mycobacteria Research Laboratories, which now includes a research team of more than 100 research personnel, including 19 faculty members.

Tuberculosis research at Colorado State has been funded largely by the National Institutes of Health and more recently by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

In 2012, Lenaerts, an associate professor of Mycobacterial Therapeutics in the Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology department, received a $1.2 million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a laboratory model that better mimics how human lungs respond to infection with the bacterium that causes tuberculosis. Lenaerts is developing a model that will target persisting strains of tuberculosis bacteria, which are the most difficult to treat.

The grant was one of five Gates Foundation grants totaling $3.65 million awarded last year to Colorado State tuberculosis researchers.

Colorado kicks off the New Year with a nod to innovation with a new satellite U.S. Patent and Trademark Office starting operations in a temporary office in Lakewood today with a downtown Denver office in the works.

In 2012, Denver beat out Portland, Ore., Seattle, Salt Lake City and Albuquerque, N.M., for the office, which is expected to lead to economic activity totaling $440 million during its first five years of operation, according to an economic study released by U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., in July when the announcement was made.

Denver is one of three new satellite U.S. Patent and Trademark Offices. The USPTO also plans for offices in or around Dallas and California’s Silicon Valley in addition to an office set to open July 13 in Detroit.

In December, via his Blog, USPTO Director David Kappos announced that, while the General Services Administration renovates Byron G. Rogers Federal Building in Denver for the new satellite office, operations will begin in a temporary office in Lakewood.

The renovation of the downtown Denver office is scheduled to be completed next summer, at which point USPTO will build out the interior office space, according to Kappos.

“All of these steps and progress will lead to the point where regional entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, Denver, and Dallas-Fort Worth will have greater insight into the patent application process and access to the USPTO facilities,” Kappos wrote in his blog.

Locally, the patent office could mean new innovation for Northern Colorado, which is already home to such facilities as Avago Technologies, Colorado State University, Hewlett Packard and the Rocky Mountain Innosphere.

Larimer County ranks among the top 20 in the nation for patents with 11 patents per 10,000 people, according to the Northern Colorado Economic Development Corporation.

“We are yet another step closer to a satellite patent office in Colorado that will bring jobs and economic development,” said Bennet, in a prepared statement. “The Lakewood office means that patent examiners and judges will begin working in Denver, providing easier access for applicants and inventors in many parts of the country. It also enhances Colorado’s reputation as a leader for innovation and entrepreneurial companies and a hotbed for cutting-edge industries. I look forward to continuing to work with Director Kappos and the agency to ensure that the opening of the Denver office is a success.”

Read More at the Coloradoan.

Courtesy of the VIN News Service

Courtesy of Boulder County Business Report

Elizabeth Ryan, an assistant professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, will continue to pursue an innovative global health research project, titled “Studying How Rice Bran Augments Mucosal Immunity.”

Ryan will use the $1 million grant to study rice bran’s ability to fight off multiple gut pathogens such as Salmonella and Rotovirus that contribute to significant morbidity and mortality of many children around the world. Rice bran – the discarded brown covering on white rice grains – has untapped health properties that could help millions of people, Ryan said.

“The number of kids who are dying of diarrhea around the world every day deserves rigorous research attention with practical, wide-reaching solutions – there are so many pathogens, and over time it wears on your gut, immunity and ability to grow,” Ryan said. “It’s very hard to vaccinate against all these bugs at the exposure levels that exist.”

Colorado State University recently was recognized by Best Colleges Online as one of the 15 top universities in the nation fighting world hunger.

In 2010, Ryan was awarded a Phase I grant for her program. Grand Challenges Explorations (GCE) Phase I recognizes individuals worldwide who are taking innovative approaches to some of the world’s toughest and persistent global health and development challenges. GCE invests in the early stages of bold ideas that have real potential to solve the problems people in the developing world face every day. Phase II recognizes those ideas that have made significant progress toward implementation.

Ryan’s project is one of the Phase II Grand Challenges Explorations grants announced earlier this month.

“Investments in innovative global health research are already paying off,” said Chris Wilson, director of Global Health Discovery and Translational Sciences at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “We’re excited that we consistently receive so many surprising ideas from around the world and that we’re able to provide a second round of funding for some of the most unconventional among them.”

Ryan, who is based in Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences, will also identify and test bran from rice varieties around the globe with her co-principal investigators: Professor Steve Dow, who is Clinical Sciences and a leader in mucosal immunology, and University Distinguished Professor Jan Leach in the College of Agricultural Sciences.

Earlier this year, these researchers published a paper in the scientific, peer-reviewed journal BMC Microbiology showing that whole rice bran supplementation to the diet reduced susceptibility of mice to infection with a specific strain of Salmonella and potentially via induction of healthy gut bacteria known as Lactobacillus.

“We’ve shown that rice bran can inhibit colonization of Salmonella in the gut as well as induce mucosal immunity,” Ryan said. “Rice bran has chemical and pre-biotic properties that could have tremendous global health impact by basically preventing and reducing the severity of diarrheal infections.”

Whole grain brown rice from select varieties have long been used for anti-inflammatory properties in Ryan’s native India as part of a medicinal system known as Ayurveda. Furthermore, the bran could protect the human gut from disease much like it protects the rice grain from pests and microbes in the fields, Ryan said. The one caveat is that the bran must be heat stabilized immediately after it’s polished off the grain – this would extend its shelf life for human consumption and even its current use as feed for pigs and cattle.

Rice varieties have been improved largely for agricultural growing purposes, but not for health purposes. But she’s working with Leach, one of the world’s authorities on rice and how plants defend themselves against pathogens, to ensure studies focus on varieties that farmers are planting.

About Grand Challenges Explorations

Grand Challenges Explorations is a $100 million initiative funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Launched in 2008, more than 700 people in 45 countries have received Grand Challenges Explorations grants. The grant program is open to anyone from any discipline and from any organization. The initiative uses an agile, accelerated grant-making process with short two-page online applications and no preliminary data required. Initial grants of $100,000 are awarded two times a year. Successful projects have the opportunity to receive a follow-on grant of up to $1 million.

The title of AAAS Fellow, one of the most prestigious honors in science, requires nomination by scientific peers. This year’s class from CSU includes three in from the Department of Chemistry and two from the Department of Biology. Fellows will be recognized at the AAAS annual meeting in Boston in February.

“Our biology and chemistry faculty are conducting cutting-edge research that is leading to new discoveries and companies as well as a better understanding of the world around us,” said Jan Nerger, dean of the College of Natural Sciences. “We are very proud of these fine scientists and their extraordinary accomplishments.”

Joining the Fellows in chemistry:

• Eugene Chen, professor - For seminal contributions to polymerization catalysis and sustainable chemistry, particularly for developing new polymerization reactions and techniques for advanced and/or sustainable polymers.

• C. Michael Elliot, professor - For creative work in inorganic synthesis and photochemistry as well as for teaching and mentoring of students and service as department head.

• Tomislav Rovis, professor - For distinguished contributions to the field of chemical synthesis, particularly for the development of nucleophilic carbene catalysis and asymmetric umpolung.

Joining the Fellows in biology:

• Donald Mykles, professor and University Honors director - For distinguished contributions to the field of crustacean physiology, particularly muscle structure and function, and the endocrinological basis of molt regulation.

• N. LeRoy Poff, professor and director of the Graduate Degree Program in Ecology - For pioneering research on stream ecology that advanced ecological theory and its application to developing solutions for critical environmental problems concerning water resources.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science awarded the distinction of fellow to 702 of its members this year. These individuals have been elevated to this rank because of their efforts toward advancing science applications that are deemed scientifically or socially distinguished.

“This financing is a clear validation of the VetDC business concept and reinforces our belief that VDC-1101 represents a promising new treatment for canine lymphoma. VetDC is rapidly establishing itself as a leader in developing novel treatments for companion animals.”

“We are thrilled to secure this funding and initiate our VDC-1101 manufacturing campaign,” stated Steven Roy, VetDC’s President & CEO. “This financing is a clear validation of the VetDC business concept and reinforces our belief that VDC-1101 represents a promising new treatment for canine lymphoma. VetDC is rapidly establishing itself as a leader in developing novel treatments for companion animals.”

About VetDC, Inc.

VetDC, a Colorado State University startup headquartered in Fort Collins, Colorado, is a veterinary biotechnology company focused on in-licensing, developing and commercializing novel biotechnologies to address serious unmet medical needs in companion animals. In 2011, the company secured seed funding from the Colorado Institute for Drug, Device and Diagnostic Development (CID4). For more information on VetDC, please visit http://www.vet-dc.com/.

Safe Harbor Statement

This news release contains "forward-looking statements" covered by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The inclusion of forward-looking statements should not be regarded as a representation that any of the company's plans or objectives will be achieved. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties and a number of important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any such forward-looking statement. These factors include, but are not limited to uncertainties associated with: drug development and regulatory review process, scientific discovery process, competition, pricing environment, financing, intellectual property, and evolution of the companion animal market. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly release the result of any revisions to these forward-looking statements that may be made to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events.

Contacts

VetDC, Inc.
Steven J. Roy, President & CEO
303-859-2072
steven.roy@vet-dc.com

'I cried'

“I cried,” said Leach, a Colorado State University Distinguished Professor of plant pathology.

Leach knew the designation would mean onerous regulations for her laboratory and greenhouse as she works to understand and strengthen rice resistance to Xanthomonas oryzae pv.oryzae, which causes bacterial blight disease and devastating crop losses across Asia.

Improving human well-being

In complying, Leach unwittingly has gained new expertise in managing dual-use research, meaning studies whose findings could greatly improve human well-being, yet in the wrong hands could be used for biowarfare or bioterrorism.

Leach’s insights recently led to her appointment as a new member of the high-profile National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity. Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, invited Leach to join the board; her two-year term began in August.

The 25-member federal advisory board, coordinated by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, is composed of leaders in a range of scientific disciplines. The board advises federal agencies about the complexities of dual-use research, and suggests guidelines to protect public health and national security without hindering scientific progress.

“I’m kind of a rosy person, so I don’t like to think about terrorists. But I don’t want to see science shut down because of irrational people,” said Leach, who works in the CSU Department of Bioagricultural Sciences and Pest Management.

Scientists critical to policy discussions

It’s critical that scientists are involved in policy discussions, she said, because they can provide fact-based views of risks and benefits of dual-use research. This year, dual-use research has been a red-hot topic among life scientists, sparked by debate over the publication of studies involving the avian H5N1 influenza virus.

“What’s important is to have rational scientists making decisions, rather than people who don’t have the full view of the science involved,” Leach said. “Many of these discussions involve risk-benefit analysis. ‘What’s the balance? If we block research because of the potential for evil, do we block our ability to help people?’”

Foremost expert in rice genomics

Leach is a foremost expert in rice genomics and the interactions between plants and pathogens at the molecular level. As a University Distinguished Professor, she is among a select group of world-class CSU professors known for outstanding scholarship and achievement.

She also is a past president of the American Phytopathological Society, a scientific organization dedicated to the study and control of plant diseases, and is current chair of the society’s Public Policy Board, among other prominent roles.

“Dr. Leach’s appointment to the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity is a great testament to her research expertise and her dedication to science as a path for improving food security and quality of life for people around the world,” said Craig Beyrouty, dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences. “Her public-policy insights are an important contribution.”

Wiping out 20 to 50 percent of crops

Leach has worked extensively with Xanthomonas oryzae pv.oryzae, a bacterial pathogen that causes rice blight disease. The disease often wipes out between 20 percent and 50 percent of rice crops raised by farmers in Asia.

That’s often disastrous because rice is the most important food crop in the developing world and the staple food for more than 3 billion people – about half the world’s population, according to the International Rice Research Institute. It is grown by subsistence farmers across Asia.

Strengthening and sustaining resistance

Leach, who employs new genomics technologies and collaborates closely with colleagues in Asia, seeks to determine how rice resistance to Xanthomonas oryzae can be strengthened and sustained. The U.S. Department of Agriculture listed the pathogen as a potential agent of bioterrorism because of ramifications for food security if it were mishandled.

The pathogen cannot spread in Colorado because of the state’s dry climate, cold winters, and because rice, the host plant, is not present. Even so, Leach follows strict regulations in her laboratory and greenhouse: the tracking of every single rice plant used in experiments; sealed and guarded work spaces; complex decontamination procedures; regular inspections; even screening and fingerprinting of lab workers by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“This bacteria is an old friend. I’ve worked with it for 30 years. So when it was designated as a select agent, I stepped back and said, ‘What do we need to do?’” Leach said. “As scientists, we are obligated to look at the disease that Xanthomonas oryzae causes in rice and to solve this problem. It’s a moral obligation. In order to keep feeding people, we need a more stable resistance.”

The importance of rice

“Every time I travel in Asia and I see how important rice is to people, and how devastating it is when a family loses a crop to disease, I realize our research has an important outcome. I always come back with a new amount of energy.”

Jan Leach

• Colorado State University Distinguished Professor of plant pathology and adjunct scientist at the International Rice Research Institute, Philippines.
• Authority on the molecular biology of plant-pathogen interactions, with particular focus on rice genomics.
• Grew up in Lincoln, Neb., and was a first-generation scholar – the first in her family to earn a college degree.
• Earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in microbiology from University of Nebraska and worked in a campus pathology lab to help pay for school; this drew her into plant pathology.
• Earned Ph.D. in plant pathology from University of Wisconsin and did post-doctoral work in Britain.
• Has studied ways to strengthen and sustain rice resistance to Xanthomonas oryzae, a bacterial pathogen that causes rice blight disease. Started this work because of opportunity to research a pathogen with a distinct role in a well-known crop, using new genetic and genomic technologies.
• Has used the work as a genomic model to understand rice within a system that includes other diseases, pests, temperature and moisture variations, and more.
• Expertise has led to new studies in biofuels and ways to boost the health benefits of rice.
• Work has been funded by National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Department of Energy and the Rockefeller Foundation, among others.
• Teaches graduate-level courses in Plant Bacteriology, Bioenergy Technology, and Advanced Molecular Plant-Microbe / Pest Interactions.
• More than a dozen people, including graduate students, work in the Leach Lab at CSU.

Rice

• Is the most important food crop in the developing world
• Is the staple food for more than 3 billion people
• Is grown throughout Asia, typically on small farms
• Has a critical role in global food security
• Has been cultivated for millennia
• Can be grown in wet environments, does not require crop rotation, and can produce three harvests per year

Source: International Rice Research Institute

The money will pay for researchers to develop a system that will modify plants currently unable to be genetically engineered. The technology will expand the number of plants able to be used for biofuels, according to DOE.

“Right now, most of the fuel we produce in biofuels is from materials that can serve as food for humans and animals,” said Eric Toone, deputy director of the DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency focused on energy. “What we’d like to do is move to a set of feedstocks that don’t compete with animals and humans.”

The grant has been awarded to CSU biology professor June Medford whose team will develop technology that will allow sorghum to be used as a biofuel. Sorghum, she said, is a crop farmers like to plant and, in its current form, is difficult to use as a fuel.

The CSU grant was awarded alongside an $890,000 grant to the Alliance for Sustainable Energy in Golden to develop more efficient solar power generators and a $380,000 grant to the University of Colorado to use nanotechnology to help create liquid fuels from natural gas.

Courtesy of The Coloradoan

Dr. Perryman, who retired in the summer, received the 2012 Distinguished Service Award for his outstanding service to the advancement of veterinary medicine over the years. He retired after nearly 30 years in the field of veterinary medicine, serving the past 11 years as dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.

Dr. Mama received CVMA’s 2012 Outstanding Faculty Award, which recognizes a CSU faculty member for his/her teaching capabilities and proficiency, unselfish assistance to practitioners and contributions to continuing education.

“Dr. Mama’s influence reaches far beyond the walls of the university,” said Dr. Mark Stetter, dean of the college. “The college has been lucky to have such passionate people as Drs. Mama and Perryman who have had a positive influence on students and the community.”

Dr. Mama’s parents supported her leaving India to study veterinary medicine at Washington State University. She attributes her success and diverse experiences to her parents’ support and commitment to help those less fortunate. She volunteers in her community and in educational opportunities overseas to improve animal care.

She engages her students in lessons by imitating her animal patients in various states of dysphoria and reenacting the effects of certain drugs on animals. Dr. Mama’s animated and energetic lessons illustrate her passion for her students and dedication to her field of study. Her clinical interests include anesthetic management of different species, anesthesia and cardiovascular disease, and improving patient safety during anesthesia.

CVMA’s mission is to improve animal welfare, promote the human/animal bond, protect public health and foster excellence in veterinary medicine through education, advocacy and outreach. For more information, go to http://www.colovma.com/.

Over the past decade or two, improved veterinary care has helped domestic pets live longer than ever before.

But old age comes with its own set of problems, and Colorado State University’s Animal Cancer Center cites cancer as the leading killer of adult pets in the United States.

At the same time, dogs have slowly become the go-to research subjects for human cancer drugs. For some cancers, canines better represent how a new drug might affect two-legged counterparts than mice or other animals, and pharmaceutical companies hold years of data on efficacy and dosage.

When a human drug doesn’t quite make it to market, though, that wealth of research can be pushed aside and nearly forgotten.

For VetDC’s President and Chief Operating Officer Steven Roy, such concrete and lucrative data shouldn’t be wasted. The company is closing the gap between human technology and reliable veterinary medicine, dubbed “reverse engineering” by Roy and his counterparts. And the gap is enormous: Nearly 200 cancer drugs are approved for human use, while the vet market has only two.

 “Whether it’s a dog or a human, cancer is a difficult thing to deal with,” Roy says. “There is actually a lot of crossover between the two, and what we found is human-issues companies weren’t interested in the animal angle. We like to think we’re giving pet owners some new hope of battling cancer.”

VetDC is less than three years old but the company has made huge steps forward, thanks in large part to the previously untapped reverse-engineering model.

One product, a lymphoma pro-drug called VDC-1101, builds off research done by Gilead Sciences, Inc. By cutting the development stage down to roughly two years – a vast improvement over the 10 years for human drugs – VetDC has proven its worth to prospective investors.

Although Roy can’t release full details until early December, the company recently secured enough funding to cover the majority of manufacturing expenses for VDC-1101.

“The entire market (for veterinary cancer drugs) is practically ignored, but you have this treasure trove of information about how these drugs work,” Roy says. “We’re shaving an enormous chunk of time by leveraging data that has already been generated.”

One-of-a-kind tech transfer

Roy, a 13-year veteran of the biotech industry, came to VetDC in 2010 from Amgen, Inc.’s California headquarters. He knew firsthand how the decade-long process of research and approval for human drugs resulted in useful data, but was frustrated when it didn’t lead to a commercial product.

VetDC was a prime opportunity for Roy and his team to make the most of existing research, particularly from pharmaceutical developers that already sought out CSU’s expansive and top-ranked veterinary programs.

“A lot of companies, both animal and human, were looking at CSU to develop new products,” Roy says. “CSU really gave us not only access to research and researchers, but we had all these companies coming together in one place. The reputation of the vet school is also a major booster – we couldn’t survive without them.”

Along with prestigious counterparts like the CSU Veterinary Teaching School and Animal Cancer Center, VetDC owes much of its early success to the university’s five-year-old commercialization and tech transfer branch, CSU Ventures.

Terry Opgenorth, CSU Ventures vice president, worked closely with Roy to target companies already involved in canine research for future human cancer drugs.

By doing so, they flipped CSU’s traditional tech-transfer model upside down.

“VetDC is a bit unique, in the sense that universities generally take technology developed by faculty and decide whether it should be licensed to an existing company,” Opgenorth said.

“As we were looking at ways to better leverage the reputation of CSU’s Veterinary Teaching Hospital, it became clear that many companies were coming to CSU for proof-of-concept work. When they abandoned their human programs, we had the opportunity to determine whether their technology could be licensed for the veterinary market.”

Due to this approach, CSU Ventures played an integral part in linking VetDC to Gilead. The California-based company is large – it posted revenues of $8.4 billion in 2011 – but had little previous interest in using existing research for veterinary medicine. Roy and Opgenorth worked with Gilead to license the Gilead technology to VetDC, and with Gilead staff to transfer data and know-how to enable VetDC’s development program for canine cancer.

Opgenorth calls VetDC a leading example of CSU Ventures’ “active incubation” approach. Just two months ago, VetDC won the 2012 Venture Showcase competition at the 2012 BioWest Conference and Expo.

“CSU Ventures is all about being creative with how we can partner university technology and resources with industry,” Opgenorth said.

More than money

Now that VetDC has secured funding for the VDC-1101 drug, Roy is eyeing a possible residency with the Rocky Mountain Innosphere. He also has his sights set on emerging projects, including a glaucoma drainage device developed by Aqueous Biomedical, Inc. and a diagnostic kit for pinpointing drug-resistant bacterial strains.

Although future funding will always be a hurdle (“It’s expensive and time-consuming in itself,” Roy says), one of VetDC’s benefits is relatively low overhead. Roy operates with a two-person staff and two small advisory boards, relying heavily on sponsored research work at CSU facilities for the expensive equipment and surgical services that can drown many startups.

Opgenorth sees VetDC’s overarching role as the same as all of CSU Ventures’ spinoffs.

“It’s really important to not just think about the monetary side of this,” Opgenorth said. “It’s just as important for the university to demonstrate it can have real impact beyond education.”

For Roy, VetDC has introduced him to an entirely new facet of the biotech world. He finds it deeply satisfying to be involved with research that quickly results in reliable, effective drugs – the kind that give Fido a fighting chance.

“People are very willing to pay for these new, possibly more expensive treatments for their pets,” Roy says. “People see them as family members, and this body of work is making people more comfortable with their aging pets.”

CSU Ventures, the entity charged with protecting and commercializing intellectual property on behalf of the university, reported that 515 new inventions were disclosed during that period. This increase puts CSU in the 99th percentile among institutions with more than $125 million in annual research funding. CSU reported more than $340 million in annual research funding in 2010-2011. Click to view performance chart.

“We have tried to fulfill our mission of bringing CSU’s innovative research into the marketplace to benefit society,” said Todd Headley, president of CSU Ventures. “Since 1963, these disclosures have spurred the development of approximately 50 startups, created licensable research materials and technologies and generated additional research dollars for CSU.”

When a researcher has made a marketable discovery or advancement, CSU Ventures wants to hear about it.

In FY2011 alone, CSU faculty in 17 different departments submitted 119 invention disclosures to CSU Ventures. This resulted in 41 license agreements, both in-state and out-of-state, as well as six new startup companies.

In addition to inventions disclosed, CSU Ventures’ totals for patent applications, license agreements, and startup companies each more than doubled from the preceding five-year period. CSU Ventures reported that 165 new license agreements were signed between 2007 and 2011, up from 58 in the period between 2002 and 2006. Concurrently, revenue from license agreements grew from $4.42 million to $8.22 million.

CSU Ventures serves as a resource for protecting and commercializing the university’s intellectual property by connecting researchers with industry, engaging external entrepreneurs and investors, and offering assistance to faculty entrepreneurs interested in creating new companies. In May, CSU Ventures entered into a partnership with Innovation Center of the Rockies to accelerate the creation of new businesses based on CSU faculty research.

CSU Ventures has engaged with a variety of CSU startups and promising technologies including:

• VetDC, a CSU startup that licenses and develops underutilized human drugs and medical devices for use in companion animals, won the Colorado Bioscience Association’s BioWest Venture showcase – a competition highlighting the state’s most promising bioscience companies.

• BioPoly LLC, an orthopedic implant company and a subsidiary of Schwartz Biomedical Company, has licensed joint implant technology developed by Sue James, Mechanical Engineering department chair, and is developing products for use in sports medicine and orthopedics.

• Brian Geiss, assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology and Susan Keenan, associate professor and director of the School of Biomedical Sciences at the University of Northern Colorado, are developing a drug that can stop replication of West Nile, dengue and yellow fever viruses.

• Carbo Analytics, a CSU startup company, is commercializing lab-on-a-chip technology from the CSU Chemistry Department that simplifies and expedites the analysis of sugars with applications in the beer, wine and biofuel industries. The company won "Outstanding Venture 2012" at the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory 25th Industry Growth Forum this fall.

• Envirofit International, a CSU startup and private, non-profit technology leader using sustainable, scalable business models to solve global health and environmental problems, has distributed more than 500,000 cleaner burning cookstoves around the world.

For additional information, instructions and the application form click here.

The two-year project, awarded through DOE’s Research Partnership for Sustainable Energy in America, aims to assess and improve water acquisition, transportation and disposal.

Carlson and his partners will work to develop computer modeling and online training materials in partnership with industry. He expects that the project will also benefit communities by reducing truck traffic, air emissions and use of water resources. The study will develop tools that will assist industry in siting and designing water treatment plants that are an essential part of the drive to recycle oil and gas related wastewater.

“This is driven by efficiency and if the industry’s more efficient with water use, there’s less risk of environmental impact,” he said. “Another benefit of recycling is a reduction of stress on agriculture water and a reduced risk of regional water depletion.”

Carlson notes, “Optimizing management of water during drilling and hydraulic fracturing could mitigate other environmental impacts including ecological degradation due to excessive truck traffic and the associated dust and land disturbance.

“There are 19,000 active wells in Weld County and most produce some water. Do we have 100 water treatment plants? Do we have one? Is it better to use some water for reuse in industry and other for agriculture? The study will develop industry targeted geographic information system (GIS) based tools that can be used to assess the logistics of water use, transportation, reuse and disposal.”

“This is the kind of public-private partnership that we support in Weld County where we have to balance the economic benefits of industry with environmental impacts on our communities,” said Weld County Commissioner Barbara Kirkmeyer. “We look forward to the results of Dr. Carlson's research.”

“Our corporate purpose is Energizing the World, Bettering People’s Lives,” said Ted Brown, Senior Vice President – Northern Region of Noble Energy. “As we continue to increase activity in the DJ Basin, we seek solutions to maximize efficiencies while minimizing impacts. Our ongoing partnership with CSU is key in achieving this goal, and living up to that corporate purpose.”

“Working together with environmental groups, industry leaders and scientists, Colorado State can act as an objective third-party to understand the complexities of the energy industry and communicate those complicated issues to the general public,” Carlson said. “We hope this collaboration will provide a unique opportunity to protect Colorado’s water resources while also enabling economic growth from the boom in oil and gas development in the region.”

Kirkmeyer is the chair and Carlson is the co-director of the Colorado Energy Water Consortium, a partnership in northern Colorado that includes government, industry, environmental groups, agricultural interests and CSU leaders working together to solve water issues associated with oil and gas drilling development including hydraulic fracturing.

Carlson is an expert on water management associated with oil and gas drilling and pollutants that can affect drinking water supplies. Also collaborating on the DOE study from CSU are Tom Bradley, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering who is an expert in systems management, and Kimberly Catton, a research scientist in civil engineering with extensive GIS experience.

About Noble Energy

Noble Energy is a leading independent energy company engaged in worldwide oil and gas exploration and production. The company has core operations onshore in the U.S., primarily in the DJ Basin and Marcellus Shale, in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, offshore Eastern Mediterranean, and offshore West Africa. Noble Energy is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and is traded under the ticker symbol NBL. Further information is available at http://www.nobleenergyinc.com/Home-4.html.

Watch a video about CSU's oil and gas research here

During this evolution, we strived to fulfill our mission of bringing CSU’s innovative research into the marketplace to benefit society.

These invention disclosures have spurred development of approximately 50 startups, created licensible research materials and technologies and generated additional research dollars for CSU.

For example, KromaTiD and OptiEnz Sensors are two growing and successful companies founded by CSU researchers that are now clients of the Rocky Mountain Innosphere, a nonprofit technology incubator in Fort Collins.

OptiEnz creates devices that allow users to continuously measure the concentration of organic chemicals, with applications ranging from monitoring for pollutants in a river to tracking the level of sugar during fermentation processes, such as beer-making.

KromaTiD developed the first fluorescent paint designed to detect chromosomal inversions. Detection rates of many human diseases and disorders can significantly improve with these chromatid paints.

I mentioned in our previous column that CSU startups VetDC and KromaTiD would be competing as finalists in the 2012 BioWest Venture Showcase competition. VetDC won the $7,500 prize and garnered attention from industry leaders, researchers and investors. Earning this award further validated its unique business model of licensing and developing innovative human biomedical technologies to address serious medical needs in companion animals.

In CSU’s Chemistry department, professor Eugene Chen, Ph.D., has developed patent-pending chemical processes that could convert small molecules derived from nonedible plant biomass into sustainable bioplastics and biofuels.

The material could be used for items ranging from optical fibers and contact lenses to furniture and automobile parts. The Colorado Cleantech Industry Association recently honored Chen as a “Research Rockstar.” Chen exemplifies the kind of research that CSU faculty are conducting — cutting-edge practical solutions that solve real environmental problems while also assisting growth of the Colorado economy.

CSU obtained a $5 million grant from oil-giant BP covering five years to study mechanisms involved with technology for oil recovery from exhausted wells. Typically, wells are abandoned after they no longer produce oil or gas at a rate that is economically viable; however, upward of 70 percent of the petroleum can remain in these wells.

Chemistry professors Amber Krummel and Chucky Henry are the project’s collaborators. Their research could potentially create new avenues for well revitalization while also minimizing environmental impacts of oil recovery.

To keep the growth of invention disclosures, startups and research dollars moving in the right direction, it’s paramount that we enhance the connection between research and commercialization through campus in-reach and community outreach efforts.

After analyzing numerous technology transfer ambassador programs at universities across the nation, we recently launched our own Ambassador Program, comprised of five doctoral students from various CSU departments. They will help us become more proactive in anticipating and identifying innovative research, creative works and potential inventions; and enhance our office’s engagement in the scientific and creative enterprises on campus.

I look forward to touching base again in the New Year. Until then, you can always find us on our website, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. We hope to see you there.

Todd Headley is president of CSU Ventures.

Courtesy of The Coloradoan

Thirty competitively selected presenters competed at the two-day forum held Oct. 23-24.

“Nationally, this is the highest award profile startup company forum in the clean energy space,” said Dale Willard, Carbo Analytics’ founder and president.

“Just having the opportunity to present was an honor, but receiving the award provides evidence investors believe we are building a solid company with the proper focus.”

Fort Collins-based Carbo Analytics licenses a CSU lab-on-a-chip technology that makes sugar analysis simple and fast for sugar-related industries.

“We’re pleased that Carbo Analytics has been recognized at this forum – in front of a room of their peers,” said Todd Headley, president of CSU Ventures.

Carbo Analytics is both a tenant of CSU’s Research Innovation Center and a nonresident client of Rocky Mountain Innosphere.

“For Dale and Carbo Analytics to receive this award at the premier event for clean energy startups is very significant,” said Mike Freeman, RMI’s CEO. “The company has a lot of potential and we look forward to their future success.”

This year’s NREL forum attracted nearly 400 investors, entrepreneurs, scientists and policy makers from across the nation.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews.com

You publish a paper in Science, one of the world’s leading scientific journals, especially when the discovery could revolutionize the pharmaceutical industry.

Artificial enzyme a new discovery

CSU Chemistry Professor Tomislav Rovis and his fifth-year doctoral student Todd Hyster, in collaboration with Professor Thomas R. Ward and Livia Knörr at the University of Basel, have produced an artificial enzyme made of metal and organic matter – two things that have not previously bonded for that purpose. The new enzyme could allow scientists to build many more complicated molecules necessary for creating drugs and cut months of work into days.

The researchers took a transition metal from the periodic table known as rhodium and combined it with mutated streptavidin, which is a protein similar to the protein found in egg whites and bonded it to biotin (vitamin H). The complex reacts with non-activated carbon-hydrogen bonds to give scientists something they can manipulate.

The research appears in today’s edition of Science. Funding for the research was provided by the National Institutes of Health.

“The focus we’re applying is to make more complicated molecules faster for things that have the potential to impact human health,” Rovis said. “With drug discovery, you take something from nature and change it so it fits a target or the problem you’re trying to solve. That process – to identify the effective compounds – can take weeks or months to identify.

Combination could speed drug discovery

“Our chemistry can be applied to make some of these more complicated targets quicker. In essence, it should allow researchers to cut the discovery process from months down to days.”

In his laboratory, Rovis uses small organic molecules to create tools or catalysts that make more elaborate molecules for pharmaceuticals that could lead to treatments for cancer and other diseases. This is a critical piece of research-and-development for pharmaceutical companies that must create and test thousands of molecules to fashion new drugs.

“Enzymes are catalysts that do things in our bodies, and they’re really good at it. What we’ve been able to do is make that enzyme artificial by putting a different metal in it,” Hyster said. “The enzyme and metal work together to facilitate a variety of transformations that your body couldn’t normally do.”

In 2010, Roche, a leading pharmaceutical company, honored Rovis and his doctoral student, Daniel DiRocco, for their research accomplishments as next-generation chemists. Rovis was one of only two professors nationally honored by the company. CSU’s graduate program in chemistry is considered one of the top 50 in the country.

Courtesy of Today at Colorado State.

When something goes awry with our DNA, finding the anomaly is like looking for that proverbial needle in a haystack. It seems almost impossible—unless you have the right tools.

A small biotech company named KromaTiD is working to provide those tools. Researchers affiliated with Colorado State University and University of Texas Medical Branch-Galveston have been developing highly specialized “paints” to help scientists and diagnosticians spot nearly imperceptible changes in human DNA. Some of these changes may be linked to diseases and disabilities, such as cancer and autism.

Dr. Susan Bailey, Dr. Andrew Ray, Dr. Edwin Goodwin, Dr. Michael Cornforth and Dr. Joel Bedford founded KromaTiD in 2007. A common thread was they had all studied the effects of radiation exposure in people during stints at NASA and the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Each had a vested interest in devising practical ways to examine and quantify chromosomal changes, including inversions.

An inversion is a small segment of DNA that breaks off, flips around, and then rejoins the chromosome. Tiny inversions may be nearly impossible to see using traditional laboratory techniques and standard chromosome paints. The newer “chromatid” paints allow researchers to color a single side of a specific chromosome and then compare it to the opposite side.

Flourescent markers leave a signature at points of interest on the DNA strands. The technology was patented by CSU and UTMB-Galveston and the license granted to KromaTiD Inc.

Discovering and diagnosing

Dr. Chris Tompkins joined the company about two years ago to manage the business side of the business. Tompkins said KromaTiD’s products and services break down into two basic classes: tools for discovering the genetic causes of diseases, and tools for diagnosing known genetic causes for diseases.

“Think of it as a process,” he said. “You can use our tools to make a link between a certain mutation and a cancer or developmental disorder by finding those genetic markers. Then once those links are discovered, we then make very specific targeted assays for that mutation.”

Business development consultant Cheryl Hite likens the technology to being able to go to a precise passage of recorded music as often as you want.

“Everyone’s tape or genome is different,” she said. She points to applications in “companion diagnostics” in which medical treatments — such as cancer chemotherapies — are tailored to an individual’s personal biochemistry and response. Little wonder interest in the technology is coming from many sectors, including pharmaceutical, medical and other biotech companies.

“Chromatid paints are designed to provide a whole lot more information to a researcher than a chromosome paint,” explained Tompkins. “You get orientation information, sequence and location — so you can really see all of the possible mutations. You can discover everything all in one set of experiments.”

Chromosome 3

KromaTiD’s research team began its painting project with Chromosome 3. The reason was that there was already a good model system, an established cell line, and a known type of cancer associated with it. Chromosome 3 is also one of the four largest chromosomes, so it made sense from a production point of view.

“By doing Chromosome 3 first, we got almost 7 percent of the genome covered with one chromosome,” Tompkins said.

Led by Dr. Andy Ray, the KromaTiD research team is currently completing work on Chromosomes 1, 2 and 4. “We’ll have the four largest chromosomes all in place,” Tompkins noted.

“We’ll have about 30 percent of the genome covered, which is a nice number for doing screening assays – not too much, not too little,” he said. “It’s kind of the Goldilocks problem. If you paint the whole thing, sometimes things can get in the way of each other, so one-third tends to be just about right.”

Chromosome 10 has also been completed. It has a known thyroid cancer gene on it, which is one of the company’s commercial interests. In the future, KromaTiD intends to offer paint kits for all 23 chromosomes, as well as for the X and Y chromosomes.

Growth anticipated

Currently, KromaTiD is generating revenue by taking on custom projects for scientists with particular problems to solve. But that focus may soon change. Tompkins predicts KromaTiD will grow from its current five employees to 30 in the next 18 months, as it prepares to launch a kit used in the diagnosis of thyroid cancer.

It is also likely that KromaTiD will outgrow its CSU campus laboratory in the coming year. Other products are also in the queue, and Tompkins expects the company will eventually reach about 100 employees.

“Right now we’re plowing ahead at a pretty steady rate,” he said. “We can go a lot faster with some investment, no doubt about it. The issue with small companies is funding, so I’m out raising capital investment so we can make much faster headway.”

Initial support for KromaTiD came via a Small Business Innovation Research Award from NASA, several funding arms of Colorado State University, Colorado’s Office of Economic Development, and the National Institutes of Health. Recently, KromaTiD became a member of Fort Collins-based Rocky Mountain Innosphere to take advantage of its support services and funding expertise.

Cytogenetics (cell genetics) is an expanding field with myriad applications in human, animal and plant health. KromaTiD is defining itself as an innovative cytogenetics company and one to watch. For more information, visit http://www.kromatid.com/.

Courtesy of InnovatioNews.com

Morgan DeFoort, co-director of the laboratory, will lead a team of researchers from CSU, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Princeton University and Envirofit International to build a semi-gasifier cookstove.

A semi-gasifier stove uses a two-step process to combust solid biomass instead of one currently used in the rocket-elbow stove that CSU engineers have improved in collaboration with spinoff company Envirofit International. Most clean cookstoves that burn wood have combustion chambers that use a rocket-elbow design.

Envirofit is a private, non-profit technology leader using sustainable, scalable business models to solve global health and environmental problems. The Federal Laboratory Consortium has honored CSU, Envirofit and Oak Ridge National Laboratory for designing and disseminating the biomass cookstove. About 50,000 of the stoves have been sold to date in developing countries including India, Nigeria, Kenya, Liberia, Ghana, Zambia, Tanzania, Uganda, Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Honduras and others.

The technology on the biomass cookstoves reduces carbon dioxide emissions by 65 percent and fuel consumption by 50 percent.

The semi-gasifier stoves will have even lower emissions, said Jessica Tryner, a second-year doctoral student working with Professor Anthony Marchese in the cookstoves lab.

“It separates the combustion process into two phases. In the first phase, combustible gasses are released from solid biomass. In the second phase, those combustible gasses are mixed with air and create a secondary flame,” Tryner said.

The project will employ high-fidelity computational fluid dynamics, or CFD, modeling for cookstoves using embedded boundary and detailed chemistry. This represents a significant stride towards improving computational simulations for biomass cookstoves and enabling accurate and reliable numerical tools for the engineering design and optimization far beyond that attempted previously. This CFD work will be led by Xingeng Gao and Azer Yalin, both professors in the Department of Mechanical Engineering.

Indoor air pollution is a leading cause of death for women and children under age 5 around the globe. Two-thirds of the world’s population use biomass to cook their food and heat their homes, but CSU’s efforts in this program will focus on designing the stoves for China and India.

“As the health data grows, it is more and more apparent that emissions reductions of improved stoves using rocket-elbow technology are not adequate,” DeFoort said. “With nearly 360 million and 690 million users respectively, China and India use more wood for cooking than any other countries. Collectively, nearly 50 percent of the global population who primarily rely on wood for cooking can be found in these two countries.”

CSU engineers are among the best in the world at developing international cookstove testing protocols, creating international standards, testing and analyzing dozens of stoves from manufacturers throughout the world and field-testing more than a dozen commercially available products and their health impacts and performance.

Led by DeFoort, students and faculty at CSU will continue to improve cookstove technology with the DOE grant by creating generic technology that could be applied to a variety of stove designs.

“The design and configuration of a cookstove is highly location specific,” DeFoort said. “Critical design choices must be made to ensure that a stove is appropriate for the fuel type, cooking tasks, and cultural habits of a particular region.”

About the Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory

Founded in 1992, the Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory has developed solutions to reduce emissions from large industrial engines, supported dozens of companies with new engine technology, made important contributions to basic combustion science, worked to define the architectures for the future electric grid, developed advanced biofuels, and brought clean energy solutions to the developing world. The laboratory has pioneered the use of undergraduate students in research programs, employed hundreds of students from across the university and helped develop a new generation of energy leaders.

Most recently, lab researchers announced they will collaborate with RTI International and others to develop a waterless toilet that converts human waste into burnable fuel and disinfected, non-potable water. The “Reinvent the Toilet Challenge,” which is made possible by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to RTI International, could significantly improve public health and quality of life among people in developing countries.

The Algae Biomass Summit, the largest conference of the Algae Biomass Organization, was held in Denver in late September. The Algae Biomass Organization is a non-profit organization dedicated to developing renewable and sustainable products suitable for commercial markets.

At the summit, Hincapie presented his findings through a poster titled “Design of an acoustic harvesting device for microalgae.” His current research could advance the process for separating microalgae from water, greatly reducing the cost of algae biofuel production. Hincapie is a fellow with IGERT, the National Science Foundation’s flagship interdisciplinary research training program, in the Multidisciplinary Approaches to Sustainable BioEnergy PhD program at CSU.

“This award is a great honor since it was based on judging from a panel of experts from the algae industry to whom Esteban had to explain his research findings,” said Anthony Marchese, associate professor of mechanical engineering. “Esteban has a bright future ahead of him and I am confident that he will be a leader in the renewable energy field.”

Hincapie was among 26 international applicants presenting individual algae research and findings in the fields of biology and engineering. The Young Algae Researcher Awards were presented to six student scientists for their research on the use of algae in creating renewable fuel and chemical products, remediating polluted water, and consuming carbon dioxide.

Outstanding research in algae awards also went to students at University of California San Diego, National Renewable Energy Lab, Arizona State University, and Utah State University.

Hincapie is also a CSU Ventures Ambassador.

The university’s Center for the New Energy Economy – an outreach center created by Ritter – received the National Cleantech Leadership Award at the association’s awards ceremony Monday, honoring Ritter’s efforts to work on a non-partisan basis with energy policymakers around the country.

Also honored as a “Research Rockstar” was Chen, a professor of chemistry who has developed patent-pending chemical processes that could create sustainable bioplastics, biofuels, and other value-added chemicals from biomass.

Ritter competed with the Colorado Renewable Energy Collaboratory and the Ecotech Institute for the honor.

“CCIA is pleased to recognize the Center for the New Energy Economy as a national leader in clean energy development,” said Christine Shapard, executive director of the Colorado Cleantech Industry Association. “Congratulations to former Governor Ritter for creating an effective organization that brings all eyes to the clean energy policy expertise that resides in Colorado.”

Governors, legislators and regulators in other states look to the Center for the New Energy Economy for non-partisan guidance on energy policy. In the past 18 months, Ritter has taught about 40 classes and given 100 talks – either keynote speeches or participation in panel discussions – from the National Association of State Energy Offices in Washington, D.C., to the National Association of Energy Service Companies in San Diego.

The center has helped build essential partnerships nationally and in Colorado around research-based clean energy solutions, workforce development and advancement of technologies that will fuel long-term, sustainable economic growth.

In CSU’s Chemistry department, Chen has developed a platform of processes to convert small molecules derived from nonedible plant biomass to bioplastics. The material could be used for everything from optical fibers and contact lenses to furniture and automobile parts. He has also developed catalytic processes that refine biomass into a platform chemical that can then be converted into biofuels and other value-added chemicals.

Officials with CSU Ventures, the university’s technology transfer arm, are optimistic about the commercial potential of the work and have filed several provisional patent applications on Chen’s processes.

“Dr. Chen exemplifies the kind of research that CSU faculty are conducting – cutting-edge practical solutions that solve real environmental problems while also assisting growth of the Colorado economy,” said Todd Headley, president of CSU Ventures.

CSU spinoff Solix BioSystems also competed in the awards Monday: CEO Joel Butler was a finalist for Cleantech Executive of the Year honor that was awarded to Mark Verheyen of TerraLUX.

The Colorado Cleantech Industry Association represents the interests of the state’s cleantech industry. The organization says Colorado State, the Colorado School of Mines and CU combined have filed more than 450 provisional, non-provisional and international clean technology patents in the past five years.

“Understanding processes associated with extracting petroleum resources from rocks in watered-out wells is at the heart of these research efforts,” said Amber Krummel, assistant professor of chemistry and the principal investigator on the grant.

The concept of an “exhausted” well is somewhat misleading – upward of 70 percent of the petroleum remains in the rock formations of many “watered-out” wells. Typically, wells are abandoned after they are no longer producing oil or gas at a rate that is economically viable. Understanding the fundamental science could create a new avenue to revitalize these wells while also minimizing environmental impacts of oil recovery.

“This project is very exciting in part because we are being given the opportunity to study fundamental molecular details that may have a large societal impact. It is very basic research at the simplest chemical level,” Krummel said. “Assuming it’s successful, it will allow us to help decision-makers in oil fields engineer solutions for more oil recovery.”

Krummel is leading the project with collaborator Chuck Henry, professor of chemistry at Colorado State. The pair will use a combination of laser experiments and nanofabrication approaches to examine the processes that occur in waterflooding an oilfield.

The need to investigate waterflood chemistry at the nanoscale is driven by the fact that the rock formations involved in many of the “exhausted” wells in Colorado and the surrounding states contain shale, limestone and sandstone. The pores in these types of rock range in diameter from 10s of nanometers to several micrometers. Understanding the impact of this variation on oil recovery could be very important.

In addition, this research eventually could be applied to a wide variety of uses including aquifer mediation, natural gas recovery or carbon dioxide sequestration where the gas, instead of escaping into the atmosphere, is put back into a geological formation.

"Understanding processes associated with extracting petroleum resources from rocks in watered-out wells is at the heart of these research efforts," Amber Krummel, assistant professor of chemistry and the principal investigator on the grant, said in a statement.

Up to 70 percent of the petroleum remains in the rock formations of many "watered-out" wells, CSU said.

Typically, wells are abandoned after they are no longer producing oil or gas at a rate that is economically viable.

Krummel is leading the project with collaborator Chuck Henry, professor of chemistry at Colorado State.

The two will use a combination of laser experiments and nanofabrication approaches to in hopes of finding ways to revitalize wells that were thought to be exhausted.

The rock formations they will focus on contain shale, limestone and sandstone. The pores in these types of rock range in diameter from tens of nanometers to several micrometers.

The results of the research also could be applied to aquifer mediation, natural gas recovery or carbon dioxide sequestration where the gas, instead of escaping into the atmosphere, is put back into a geological formation.

Courtesy of the Northern Colorado Business Report

“We look forward to working closely with KromaTiD and OptiEnz Sensors,” said Doug Johnson, VP of capital access for the Innosphere. “These types of advancements in technology are the exact outcomes we had hoped for when forming the public/private partnership with UniverCity Connections.”

CSU Research Foundation, and more recently, CSU Ventures have been Innosphere supporters since the beginning of the technology incubator 14 years ago. The Innosphere looks forward to continuing these successful relationships to accelerate the success of high-impact scientific and technology start-up companies and promote the development of a regional entrepreneurial ecosystem in Colorado.

OptiEnz Sensors create devices that allow users to continuously measure the concentration of organic chemicals, with applications ranging from monitoring for pollutants in a river to tracking the level of sugar in during fermentation processes, like beer making. OptiEnz biosensors are placed directly in the stream or reaction vessel, so there is no need for someone to painstakingly remove samples, send them to a laboratory and wait hours or days for results. That allows their users to get the information they need rapidly so they can optimize their process or take corrective actions sooner rather than later.

The company already has a prototype for continuous monitoring that is being tested in a variety of settings and is at work on a next-generation version for on-site assays. “We should have our handheld device prototype in a year, which will only be the size of about 4 iPhones,” said Ken Reardon, CSU faculty founder and CTO of OptiEnz Sensors. “We’ve received enthusiastic response from companies we have spoken to on our technology. CSU Ventures has always been supportive and we’re excited to now be an Innosphere client.”

KromaTiD became an Innosphere client in August 2012 and is all about innovative solutions in a branch of molecular diagnostics called cytogenetics. They developed the first fluorescent paint designed to color a chromatid, which is one side of a chromosome. Currently, less than 10% of clinically significant chromosome inversions can be identified with existing technologies. With KromaTiD being able to color one side of a chromosome, scientists are able to see which side has the “defect” in it creating a platform for the discovery and detection of inversions; especially in cases where inversions may not occur in all cells, like in most cancers. This paint detects changes in individual cells, not pooled DNA, making detection more suitable for clinical diagnostic use.

“Many human diseases and disorders, such as autism, infertility, or cancer can be helped with this technology because detection rates significantly improve with chromatid paints,” said Chris Tompkins, president and CEO of KromaTiD. “The Innosphere is a fantastic partner and has provided us with the guidance and services to help our company take the next step into the business world.”

With KromaTiD launching its first commercial platform and OptiEnz Sensors exploring opportunities in the food and beverage industry to detect chemicals in our food, they are both exceptional companies on the track to success, and the Rocky Mountain Innosphere is excited to welcome them as clients. The Innosphere provides entrepreneurial start-up companies with resources such as assistance with raising capital, access and connections with academic and government institutions and educational opportunities for realizing business success.

For more information contact Mike Freeman, CEO, Rocky Mountain Innosphere (970) 818-7736.

Read more here.

Nearly half the world’s population cooks over fires that use wood, charcoal and other biomass for fuel. As a result, they are exposed to carbon monoxide, black carbon and a host of other toxins. The cookstove helps eliminate those risks and has been selected by AUTM (Association for University Technology Managers) for the 2012 Better World Project.

The AUTM selection highlights the need for safe, affordable cooking in developing countries. Despite the severity — and enormity — of health problems surrounding traditional cookstoves and open-flame cooking, the issue largely remains outside the public consciousness. The Envirofit G3300, currently sold in more than 40 countries emits up to 80 percent less smoke and harmful gases, uses 60 percent less fuel, and reduces cooking times by 40 percent.

Non-profit Envirofit was founded in 2003 by two students and two professors from Colorado State University. In 2007, Envirofit was charged to build a safer, affordable cookstove with funding from the Shell Foundation’s program for indoor air pollution initiatives. The CSU inventors—Morgan DeFoort, Ph.D., Bryan Willson, Ph.D., Nathan Lorenz, M.Sc., Anthony Marchese, Ph.D., Michael P. Brady, Ph.D., and Daniel D. Miller-Lionberg—saw the result of their work in 2008, when the Envirofit G3300 Clean Cookstove entered production.

In May 2009, CSU Ventures (the university’s technology transfer office) licensed the technology to Envirofit. “We have a pretty progressive tech transfer office here at CSU, and they did a very nice job of shepherding the relationship,” says DeFoort, who describes CSU Ventures as very supportive. “They let Envirofit have a seat at the table as we sorted out the IP [intellectual property] and decided what was worth patenting and what wasn’t,” he says.

Envirofit began marketing its product in India, and by 2010, it started distributing in Africa and then Latin America. The core technology from the G3300 Clean Cookstove is now used in five other Envirofit wood and charcoal stoves. So far, the nonprofit has sold more than 350,000 clean cookstoves around the world.

In 2010, the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves was formed, with Colorado State University and Envirofit as founding members. Led by the United Nations Foundation, it’s a public-private partnership of more than 60 national governments, UN agencies, private companies and nongovernmental organizations, all working towards a clean efficient approach to cooking.

The AUTM Better World Project was launched in 2005 to promote public understanding of how academic research and technology transfer benefits millions of people around the world. The project draws from years of case studies and news from AUTM's members — the professionals who make academic technology transfer happen.

The Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) is a nonprofit organization with an international membership of more than 3,000 technology managers and business executives. AUTM members — managers of intellectual property, one of the most active growth sectors of the global economy — come from more than 300 universities, research institutions and teaching hospitals as well as numerous businesses and government organizations.

Fort Collins - Retired at 69, James Lewis and his wife, Jamie, are empty-nesters living in Cheyenne with their dog, Sassy.

With their two children living in Denver, Sassy, a 10-year-old Shetland sheepdog, tends to rule the house as a genuine member of the family.

In June, Lewis, 69, took Sassy into their local veterinarian after noticing some bumps on the right side of her back. A biopsy showed that Sassy had cutaneous lymphoma, a form of skin cancer that is typically fatal in dogs.

Sassy was given one to six months to live, and the Lewises prepared for the worst, expecting to put the dog down before the cancer became too painful for her to bear.

Then Lewis learned of a new study at CSU’s veterinary school involving the start-up company, VetDC, and its new drug called VDC-1101, which is designed for cancer treatments in companion animals, primarily dogs and cats.

Sassy started going through intravenous chemotherapy testing of VetDC’s new drug. Friday, Sassy went in for her fourth round of treatment and has seen visible improvements, which Lewis calls nothing short of a miracle.

“CSU put her in the program ... and it has just been miraculous. Really, it is really helping her out, and most of those growths are insignificant now. They’re hard to see,” Lewis said.

Aside from some nausea and sickness, Lewis said Sassy is doing great and he expects that her cancer will go into remission with the help of VetDC.

“It is really great,” he said. “It really is, because we were going through the grieving process and thinking we’re going to lose her, and then it is reborn. It is a great relief.”

World's Premier Vet Cancer Co.

Steven Roy, VetDC president and CEO, sat in the conference room on the second floor of the of Colorado State University’s Veterinary Teaching Hospital, 300 W. Drake Road, where the company has access to world-class veterinary and animal cancer centers.

Roy has grand plans to build VetDC into not just Colorado’s or the nation’s best vet cancer company, but the world’s best. The reason Roy thinks they have a shot at such an ambitious goal is that they are focused on what he calls a “bouquet” market in cancer treatment for pets.

Read the full article online at the Coloradoan.

The university plans to do so by increasing its profile as a research and development shop for businesses that increasingly have outsourced their research to universities, said Bill Farland, CSU's vice president for research.

"In order for us to grow, we're going to have to grow in that private-sector funding," he said.

The move, incorporated in the university's strategic plan, follows an ominous speech by Tony Frank in which the university president warned that the state of Colorado would no longer be able to fund higher education in the coming years. He said the university was evaluating its options to shore up any losses in state funding.

Similarly, CSU Research has begun preparing for its forecasted federal funding decline.

It hired Mark Wdowik, chairman of the Rocky Mountain Innosphere, as assistant vice president for Research and Industry Partnerships earlier this year. Wdowik has held administrative roles in technology transfer at CSU Ventures and at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

He now is tasked with strengthening CSU's existing relationships with industry and developing new ties in the newly created position.

That will be an important job because businesses have gradually shifted their sights toward universities to perform their R&D in the past decade, Farland said.

"Our expectation is that we will try to grow in that sector significantly over the next couple of years," he said.

CSU officials are visiting other universities that excel in this kind of work. They want to learn from Texas A&M; University of California, Davis; North Carolina State University, Virginia Tech and Michigan State University.

These forward-looking efforts come despite the $340 million that CSU raised this year. The university raised $330.8 million last year.

"We'd like to grow faster if it were possible," Farland said. "Given the circumstances with the federal budget and the fact that there continues to be very significant competition for those available dollars, we're doing great."

This year's increase marked the fifth straight year that research funding exceeded $300 million.

That level of research funding ranks CSU behind only No. 1 Georgia Tech for universities without medical schools, Farland said.

This year's increase came from an all-time high of 2,225 proposals for funding in fiscal 2012, up 7.5 percent from last year. Researchers craft the proposals tailored to government programs, but each college has staff who provide support.

CSU's research funding comes from three major sources: the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, U.S. Department of Agriculture and National Science Foundation.

CSU's College of Engineering wins the most federal research funding. Individual faculty members win an average $600,000 in funding annually for a total of around $60 million. The College of Veterinary and Biological Sciences also operates a strong program, which typically nets $40 to $50 million, Farland said.

Farland, who holds a doctorate in cell biology and biochemistry, said technology plays a critical role in the university's research. CSU's Center for Extreme Ultraviolet Science and Technology in the engineering college represents a prime example with its lasers, imaging and nano-manufacturing technology.

Large funding awards this year have gone to biologist Pat Bedinger to investigate how wild tomatoes could aid the design of potatoes resistant to the fungus that caused the Irish potato famine and still threatens potato crops globally. The idea is to use cutting-edge molecular biology to study crop genes.

CSU researchers also recently received five Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grants totaling about $3.65 million to study tuberculosis.

Another CSU professor has developed a new, longer-lasting joint implant that is being sold in Europe and may soon be available in the U.S.

Hopes are that the university will continue to raise plenty of money to fund these kinds of advanced technologies that aid vital research.

Steve Lynn covers technology for the Northern Colorado Business Report. He can be reached at 970-232-3147, slynn@ncbr.com or twitter.com/SteveLynnNCBR.

Courtesy of Northern Colorado Business Report

Tim Reeser, Vice President of CSU Ventures and Executive Director of Cenergy, will serve as the moderator of Wednesday’s 9:45am panel discussion. “There are seven innovative and emerging technology companies presenting in the panel,” said Reeser. “It’s amazing that so many of these environmentally sound solutions and projects began here at CSU and in Northern Colorado.”

“We are proud that OptiEnz Sensors and Logimesh Technologies are both clients of the Innosphere,” said Mike Freeman, CEO of the Innosphere. “They are industry experts and will have great insights to share during the panel. I look forward to their educational discussion about complex issues and finding viable solutions.”

Wednesday will be the last day of the Natural Gas Symposium, which is a three day event dedicated to providing diverse stakeholder perspectives on the emerging and unconventional energy markets. The symposium has an emphasis on how the natural gas economy impacts Colorado, the United States, and places around the globe. All panels will be video steamed on www.naturalgas.colostate.edu.

Ken Reardon, CTO of OptiEnz Sensors, will discuss new methods of measuring concentrations of organic chemicals of concern. OptiEnz Sensors, a spinoff from Colorado State University, provides sensing solutions for the measurement of organic chemicals in water and other aqueous media, with the overarching value proposition of providing continuous, real-time and in-place measurements. The company already has a prototype for continuous monitoring that is being tested in a variety of settings and is at work on a next-generation handheld version for on-site assays. “We should have our handheld device prototype in a year,” said Reardon. “We’ve received enthusiastic response from companies we have spoken to on our technology.”

Bill Gillette, Logimesh Technologies CEO and founder, will discuss how his company has developed a self-powered wireless device that can interface with a range of sensors to provide real-time remote monitoring of natural gas engines and compressors. “The Logimote™ device can also be configured to provide real-time, continuous monitoring of water quality in energy water storage and handling systems, as well as air and water quality in the environment at or near well pads,” said Gillette. “We are planning demo trials with prototypes installed on drilling rig equipment within the month. This presentation will discuss the products that Logimesh has developed and current applications including energy water handling optimization and engine health monitoring.”

The Rocky Mountain Innosphere is a regional non-profit formed to accelerate the success of high impact scientific and technology start-up companies in Northern Colorado and provides entrepreneurial start-up companies with resources such as assistance with raising capital, access and connections with academic and government institutions and educational opportunities for realizing business success.

For more information contact Mike Freeman, CEO, Rocky Mountain Innosphere (970) 818-7736.

CSU has started an $18.5 million, 65,000-square-foot expansion of the Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory (EECL) in the historic power plant building in North Old Town.

The expanded facility will be called the Powerhouse Energy Institute, and will house the EECL and its programs, plus former Gov. Bill Ritter’s Center for the New Energy Economy and the Department of Mechanical Engineering’s Industrial Assessment Center.

Other energy programs, both inside and outside of CSU, may join the institute as well.

“We’re happy to join the institute — we believe that co-locating energy policy staff with energy technologies will spur greater innovation for both groups,” Ritter, director of CSU’s Center for the New Energy Economy, said in a news release.

Private donations, including $5 million from the Bohemian Foundation and $2.5 million from Woodward Inc., are helping to pay for the expansion. The Downtown Development Authority and the Gates Family Foundation also have contributed.

The EECL will continue fundraising through 2014 and soon will launch a public campaign to raise money.

CSU said the “expansion will be one of the most sustainable and energy-efficient buildings ever built and will serve a role as a laboratory for advanced building technology.”

The building will use combined heat and power (instead of a boiler for heating), advanced LED lighting and daylighting controls, and wind, solar and biomass plus extensive energy storage, and more, to achieve energy efficiency.

CSU said the EECL has “developed solutions to reduce emissions from large industrial engines, supported dozens of companies with new engine technology, made important contributions to basic combustion science, worked to define the architectures for the future electric grid, developed advanced biofuels, and brought clean energy solutions to the developing world. The laboratory has pioneered the use of undergraduate students in research programs, has employed hundreds of students from across the university, and has helped develop a new generation of energy leaders.”

Courtesy of the Denver Business Journal

That’s a lesson Morgan DeFoort learned touring and living in developing countries whose residents become ill from inhaling toxic fumes from the cookstoves they use in their homes.

“I’ve toured lots of villages in India where people are using cookstoves and you see the kids, the families and the smoke,” DeFoort said. “They’re cooking with a biofuel, and it’s sustainable, but it’s killing them. Seeing that is pretty powerful.”

That led DeFoort to the realization that there’s a direct connection between access to energy and human health — a realization that formed part of the foundation for his research in biofuels, renewable energy and the use of natural gas.

“It’s remarkable as an engineer to hear that what you do can impact human health,” he said.

Today, as the co-director of the Engines and Energy Conversion Lab at Colorado State University, DeFoort is one of the masterminds behind this week’s three-day natural gas symposium at CSU, which begins Monday morning and continues through Wednesday evening in the Lory Student Center ballroom.

DeFoort, who serves on the board of directors for the Rocky Mountain Sustainable Living Association and on the technical advisory board of the efficient cookstove maker and CSU spinoff EnviroFit International, takes a highly pragmatic approach to how renewables, energy efficiency measures and fossil fuels can be used across the globe to improve quality of life.

“In the developed world, we’re trying to get more efficient, but in the developing world, there are very inexpensive solutions out there that have a big impact on human health,” he said.

Traces of emissions spewed from small engines used for transportation in China have been found in the United States, showing that making engines in the developing world less polluting and more efficient is really a global problem that’s relatively easy to solve, he said.

“You realize we’re all sharing the same air,” he said.

Very poor countries aren’t using many fossil fuels but need to ensure better public health, he said. Yet, if they use energy in the same way that Western countries have used fossil fuels, both natural resources and clean air will disappear fast, he said. So, energy development and consumption are very complex topics. And that’s what this week’s natural gas symposium aims to tackle, he said.

Natural gas has an equally complex place in the United States as part of a push toward renewable energy development in an era of climate change, something DeFoort has researched extensively at CSU.

“I don’t think people really understand how important it is as a fuel for renewables,” DeFoort said.

If we begin to use more solar and wind power for electricity, there is currently no feasible way to store that electricity for when the wind stops blowing or the sun stops shining. So, there has to be a backup source of electricity produced from fossil fuels.

“Coal-fired power plants don’t like to go up and down,” DeFoort said. “Natural gas can go up and down very quickly.”

In other words, natural gas power plants can efficiently fill in for wind and solar farms when they can’t produce energy, making natural gas an ideal supplement for renewables, he said.

But with numerous questions about the climate change implications of natural gas systems leaking methane into the air and the human health impacts of hydraulic fracturing, a technique used by drillers to crack underground rock to release natural gas, using natural gas is far from a harmless solution to the nation’s energy needs, he said.

“CSU is a good platform to have a discussion around what it takes to do natural gas right,” he said. “What does it mean to do it right? I would consider myself an environmentalist and a big proponent of renewables — that’s where I’ve spent my career — and I see natural gas as a big potential solution. But then it’s always with this caveat: If it’s done right.”

He said his research shows natural gas can be as much a blessing as it is a curse, but an intelligent discussion about reducing the impacts of natural gas is necessary to help get renewables off the ground.

“It’s illogical to believe that there is zero impact,” he said.

He said he’s seen how access to energy has enormous benefits for human health, but it also can have tremendously negative environmental and health consequences.

Cookstoves are a good example, he said, because millions are dying because they have a device emitting toxic pollutants in their homes.

“That’s an energy problem” showing that better health in developing countries requires tradeoffs, he said.

“You can’t take a perfectly hard line and say I’m not going to use any fossil fuels,” DeFoort said. “You also can’t say ‘I’m not going to have any environmental harm.’ It’s inevitable you’re going to have some. If we use it too much, if we extract energy resources in the wrong way, if it’s done poorly, we take something good and make it bad.”

Courtesy of the Coloradoan

FORT COLLINS - Two Colorado State University professors have developed a nanostructured surface coating for bone that is expected to help improve the lifetime of bone implants.

The research, if proven, could someday help someone replace injured or diseased bone segments without losing a limb.

Matt Kipper, associate professor of chemical and biological engineering and biomedical engineering, has received a three-year, $300,000 grant from the Muscoskeletal Transplant Foundation to take his discovery to the next level and test it using bone allografts. Allografts are bones that are donated through tissue banks and used to replace large segments of missing bone following massive limb trauma or tumor surgery. Kipper, who is in the College of Engineering, will work with Dr. Nicole Ehrhart in the Animal Cancer Center, part of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, on the research.

“These types of implants have a high incidence of failure, related to healing where that implant was put in. Sometimes failures occur years after the implant procedure,” Kipper said.

Kipper developed a tiny or nanostructured material that can coat a large, dead piece of bone like a femur thigh bone. His new coating stabilizes important proteins that drive bone cell differentiation and cell activities associated with the creation of new healthy bone. He uses adult stem cells derived from bone marrow or fat to help healthy cells grow in the place of dead cells in existing bone implants.

“We control the structure of these coatings at the molecular scale,” Kipper said, noting that scientists must use a special microscope to study nanoscale features that are smaller than wavelengths of light. “We’ve proven this by growing cells on other types of surfaces – glass, titanium and plastic. “Now we’re translating those materials to bone.

“I couldn’t do this if I weren’t at an institution that had a top research veterinary school.”

Ehrhart is a professor in Surgical Oncology and a specialist in cancer surgery at Colorado State’s Animal Cancer Center. She developed a method to perform limb salvage surgeries in small animals using bone allografts and is working with Kipper to test the healing of coated bones versus noncoated bones. Together they hope to demonstrate that they can safely stabilize the proteins they want and cause stem cells to grow. This research will benefit both humans and animals at risk for losing a limb due to massive bone trauma or bone cancer.

See video here

A CSU mechanical engineering professor, Willson’s three-year assignment to the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy, known as ARPA-E, will focus on natural gas and stimulating new technologies to reduce the environmental impact of production and developing beneficial new uses for natural gas.

Willson will continue to serve in his position as director of CSU’s Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory. He also is founding director of the university’s Clean Energy Supercluster, a campuswide effort to foster and support clean energy research in all eight CSU colleges and move technological advancements more quickly to the marketplace.

“This is a high honor for Dr. Willson and for the university,” said Bill Farland, vice president for Research at Colorado State. “The connections he builds through the Department of Energy will assist many researchers around the country including the great work being conducted here at CSU.”

Under Willson’s leadership over the past 20 years, the Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory has done more than any group in the world to address impacts of natural gas pipelines, helping industry partners reduce environmental effects of natural gas compression as well as improve efficiency. Much of the research originated with new requirements for industry created through the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 1990 Clean Air Act. Research is primarily focused on advanced ignition systems, fuel injection systems and aftertreatment systems.

“Natural gas will be a key component in our intentions as a nation of moving away from our reliance on oil to more renewable sources,” Willson said. “I look forward to this new opportunity with the DOE.”

Since founding the Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory, or EECL, in 1992, Willson has been committed to using innovative science and engineering coupled with an entrepreneurial, market-based approach. The ultimate goal is to develop and disseminate solutions to global, large-scale energy problems.

Willson started the cookstoves program at the university and cofounded - with two students and another faculty member - Envirofit International, a private, non-profit technology leader using sustainable, scalable business models to solve global health and environmental problems. Earlier this year, the university, Envirofit and Oak Ridge National Laboratory were honored by the Federal Laboratory Consortium for designing and disseminating a cleaner burning cookstove that is directly helping households throughout the developing world.

The Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory twice has been named on the list of Popular Science’s 25 “Most Awesome College Labs.” Willson’s many personal awards include being named to the “Scientific American 10” honor roll for innovations that benefit humanity. He is also an International Fellow of the Society of Automotive Engineers.

The research dollars set a new record high for the university and mark the fifth year in a row that spending has exceeded $300 million.

CSU a leader in research spending

Additionally, the increase in research dollars keeps the university on the map nationally: In the most recent report from the National Science Foundation for Fiscal Year 2008-2009, Colorado State ranks second in the nation among public research universities without a medical school.

For FY2012, research expenditures grew to roughly $340 million from about $330 million in FY2011. FY2012 ended on June 30.

“These research expenditures represent an achievement for CSU and its faculty, who are competitive in a world of declining or flat financial resources,” said Bill Farland, vice president for Research. “The investment that private industry and federal agencies continue to make in our programs indicates they are confident in our abilities to conduct cutting-edge research that is helping people and even creating jobs.”

The term "research expenditures" reflects actual annual spending of funding from a variety of sources including federal, state and local government as well as private sector. Research awards are the dollars awarded in one year to researchers. Often, a research grant awarded in one year (grant award) will be expended over a number of years (research expenditure), which is the standard way of assessing a university's level of research activity nationwide.

CSU faculty submitted 2,255 proposals for funding in FY 2012 – up 7.5 percent over 2,097 proposals submitted in FY 2011 and an all-time high. Grants awarded rose to nearly $268 million – an increase of $14 million.

Federal funding strong despite cuts

Federal funding accounts for 67 percent of the total research expenditure dollars from such agencies as:

• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services ($52.3 million),

• U.S. Department of Agriculture ($47.2 million),

• National Science Foundation ($36.7 million), and

• U.S. Department of Defense ($36.3 million).

Local funds totaled $48 million including $36 million in legislated- or sponsor-required (i.e., matching) funds.

A breakdown of CSU expenditures for the past seven years:

• 2012 - $340 million
• 2011 - $330.8 million
• 2010 - $302.9 million
• 2009 - $311.7 million
• 2008 - $302.6 million
• 2007 - $296.0 million
• 2006 - $267.4 million

Highlights of the 2012 Fiscal Year:

• Industrial funding grew $800,000 based on increased effort to grow this sector despite the down economy.

• Investments in the Colorado State University Research Foundation and the university’s Superclusters grew $1.45 million.

• Among the larger awards to faculty: 
  • Biologist Pat Bedinger received a $5.8 million National Science Foundation grant to investigate whether wild tomatoes could help researchers design potatoes resistant to the fungus that caused the Irish potato famine and still threatens potato crops around the globe.
  • Colorado State tuberculosis researchers recently received five Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grants totaling about $3.65 million to develop everything from models that better mimic the impact of tuberculosis infection in humans to tuberculosis-detecting tests that can be used in countries with few resources.

• Not included in the release are figures from Colorado State Forest Service fire-related activities since the fire-related responsibilities and expenditure activity of the CSFS is moving to Colorado Department of Public Safety as of FY13. These funds will be included in FY12 final reports to federal agencies.

Courtesy of Today at Colorado State.

FORT COLLINS – VetDC, a Colorado State University spinoff company, has won the Colorado Bioscience Association’s annual Biowest Venture Showcase – an annual competition intended to highlight some of the state’s up-and-coming startup bioscience companies.

VetDC was created to transition underused devices, tests and treatments from human medicine into companion animal veterinary markets. The company works with pet owners and veterinarians at the CSU Veterinary Teaching Hospital to develop and market new veterinary products.

Executives of VetDC competed with five other companies in Denver Tuesday to pitch their technologies and business plans to a panel of bioscience experts and venture capitalists in the Biowest Venture Showcase, which is part of the Biowest Conference. Also competing Tuesday was KromaTID, another spinoff from CSU.

VetDC took home a $7,500 cash prize in the competition.

"We are thrilled and honored to be selected for this award, particularly given the high caliber of emerging bioscience companies participating in this year's showcase"; said Steven Roy, CEO of VetDC. “While transitioning medical advancements from animal testing to humans is quite common, innovations by human-focused biotechnology companies are rarely targeted for veterinary uses. Many of these therapies have great potential to benefit animals - and that’s where VetDC comes in.”

“We are pleased that VetDC won this competition and that two of our most successful startup companies are getting some well-deserved attention from the bioscience industry in Colorado,” said Todd Headley, president of CSU Ventures.

Also making presentations Tuesday were Longmont-based Flashback Technologies, Inc.; CSU startup KromaTID; and two Boulder-based companies, Siva Therapeutics Inc. and SuviCa Inc.

VetDC primarily focuses on cancer, but it also is exploring unmet medical needs in other areas including infectious disease and opthamology. VetDC is developing a test that quickly identifies drug-resistant bacterial strains in animals with infections. It’s also evaluating a new glaucoma device to help prevent blindness in pets.

VetDC recently signed an agreement with Gilead Sciences Inc. to develop and commercialize a new cancer drug that targets and attacks lymphoma cancer cells in dogs. Lymphoma is the most common cancer afflicting dogs in the United States, and cancer is a top cause of death for dogs. While lymphoma is typically treated in companion animals with human chemotherapy drugs, nearly all treated animals ultimately relapse, leaving them with few viable medical options. The VetDC drug may provide a new alternative for pets suffering from this deadly disease.

More information about VetDC is available at www.vet-dc.com

Check out 9 News' video that highlights each of the finalists.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is the first in a series of five-question INterviews of people who are playing a significant role in encouraging and furthering new technology and innovation in Colorado.

Q: In May, CSU Ventures and Innovation Center of the Rockies announced a collaboration to help commercialize research at CSU. ICR already had similar agreements in place with CU-Boulder and the School of Mines and this month added the University of Denver. What benefits do you see in all these schools being connected through the ICR and having ICR as a commercialization partner?

A: ICR leverages a huge network of experts to assist us in evaluating product and business opportunities for CSU technologies. Bringing additional schools into the partnership will increase the opportunities for individuals already within the network as well as providing an opportunity, in our case, to recruit more individuals in the Fort Collins area and CSU alumni into the network. The stronger the network, the better for everyone involved – both people in the network and the university technology transfer offices.

Q: I understand all marketable CSU research now goes through CSU Ventures for commercialization. When did this take effect and why is it set up this way?

A: CSU Ventures has been in existence for approximately five years and was somewhat functioning separately but in conjunction with the CSU Research Foundation’s Technology Transfer Office. The two organizations were in some ways sister organizations and worked very closely together behind the scenes. By bringing all the technology transfer activities together into CSU Ventures (under the CSU Research Foundation) we have eliminated some real brand confusion internally and externally related to what single organization leads technology transfer efforts for CSU.

Q: How does CSU currently fare when it comes to patents issued as compared to its sister research institutions? Do you have numbers?

A: Issued patents are one metric although it probably does not tell much of the overall story. If you look at the primary technology transfer results for CSU in the five-year period since CSU Ventures’ creation (2007-2011) vs. the preceding five-year period (2002-2006), every metric has nearly doubled or significantly more than doubled. In fact, that growth places us at or above the 90 percentile nationally in most categories for universities with $100M or more in research expenditures. More information is available on our website, www.csuventures.org.

READ COMPLETE ARTICLE at Innovationews.com

The Proof-of-Concept grants under the Bioscience Discovery Evaluation Grant Program are intended to support bioscience discoveries that will likely lead to the development of new products, services, businesses and employment in the bioscience industry in Colorado. Grants will be made through the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade (COEDIT) to Technology Transfer Offices (TTO) affiliated with qualified Colorado Research Institutions.

Click here for additional information and application instructions.

I wanted to highlight some recent accomplishments of several CSU startups.

Cancer detection and treatment: KromaTiD and VetDC are two early stage companies chosen to compete for $7,500 among six finalists at the Venture Showcase Competition, a component of the 2012 BioWest Conference, to be held Sept. 11 in Denver.

KromaTiD has developed diagnostic tools to detect defects and damage to human chromosomes called inversions, which play a key role in cancer and developmental disorders. CSU founders include professors Susan Bailey and Andrew Ray.

VetDC is a Colorado-based veterinary biotechnology company that leverages human biomedical technologies to address unmet medical needs in companion animals. Given its relationship with CSU's Veterinary Teaching Hospital and Animal Cancer Center, VetDC is in a unique position to develop new products for veterinary use. It is currently pursuing a drug to fight canine lymphoma.

Improving air quality: Each year, the Association of University Technology Managers asks members to submit stories of university-created inventions that have had a significant impact on the world. Envirofit’s cookstove, which incorporates multiple CSU-created technologies, is featured in the association’s 2012 Better World Report.

EnviroFit is a Fort Collins-based company formed by Paul Hudnut, Bryan Willson, Nathan Lorenz, and Timothy Bauer. Developed in part in CSU’s Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory, the G3300 Clean Cookstove is EnviroFit’s most successful product. It reduces smoke and harmful gases emitted during cooking, uses less fuel and reduces cooking times.

Joint implants: A new, longer-lasting joint implant material developed by CSU professor Susan James in conjunction with BioPoly LLC is now being sold in Europe. The company’s first product, the BioPoly RS Partial Resurfacing Knee Implant System, features a self-lubricating and wear-resistant surface that replaces only damaged cartilage, thus decreasing a patient’s overall recovery time.

James says the next step is developing similar materials for cardiovascular usage where the material could provide greater durability and help prevent blood clotting.

Partnerships: We strive to help young businesses evolve into lasting, viable companies. To this end, CSU Ventures recently entered into a partnership with The Innovation Center of the Rockies to speed up creation of new businesses based on CSU research.

This partnership marks a major milestone that will help CSU Ventures commercialize intellectual properties holding the most promise by matching top faculty and graduate researchers with the center’s entrepreneurial network of more than 1,000 mentors and advisers.

We are proud to be associated with the companies that have achieved their own important milestones and the innovators who are making a difference.

Todd Headley is director of technology transfer for the Colorado State University Research Foundation.

Otsuga has more than 10 years of technology transfer and commercialization experience translating research results to create positive impacts on society. He worked in university and industry technology transfer activities in California and Utah, and spent three years as the founding director at the Technology Transfer Office at South Dakota State University, where he helped increase licensing revenue by 250 percent and industry-sponsored research awards by 540 percent. Most recently, Otsuga was the executive director of the Technology Transfer Office at the University of Kentucky.

“With 10 years of combined experience in technology acquisition for industry and technology commercialization leadership in academia, Denny is a significant addition to the CSU Ventures team and CSU. In particular, his technical expertise and background in molecular biology, plant sciences, agriculture and biofuels are major assets,” said Todd Headley, president of CSU Ventures.

“His experience and vision in technology commercialization leadership will further strengthen CSU Ventures in its mission to support and transfer CSU innovations into the marketplace.”

Otsuga received his scientific training in plant molecular genetics and earned his doctorate at the University of Utah. He obtained industry experience from a biofuel feedstock development biotechnology company in the Los Angeles area, where he was responsible for managing relationships with universities through sponsored research and technology license agreements.

The free all-day event, held Aug. 7 at the Drake Centre in Fort Collins, brought together nearly 200 registrants who had a chance to meet with research laboratory representatives and learn how to cut through some of the confusion that can be daunting when first wading into government agency waters.

In addition to a panel discussion on how to dismantle barriers when working with federal laboratories, the event also featured roundtable discussions on small business and small tech transfer grants, Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs), patents and licensing, commercialization and marketing and strategic local partnerships.

Josh Birks, the city of Fort Collins economic health director, gave the event’s keynote address, “The Role of Technology Transfer in Building a Strong Regional Economy.”

Birks said the region is fortunate to have many of the right ingredients needed to foster a “regional innovation ecosystem,” which can translate into the creation of good jobs for local residents.

“We do have the assets and the ingredients,” Birks said. “We have a whole host of assets and we need to think about how we can (create an innovation ecosystem) to an even greater degree.”

But Birks said the city of Fort Collins — which recently listed support of innovation as among its top priorities — needs partners, including the two dozen federal laboratories located mostly along the Northern Front Range.

“We recognize we can’t do it alone,” he said. “That’s why it has to happen at the regional level and involve multiple partners.”

Birks said the city is taking a different approach to job creation by not “hunting” for a Fortune 500 company to come to Fort Collins but by nurturing companies already here and helping to build them into new Fortune 500 firms.

Matt Ringer, commercialization program manager for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, said NREL is doing pioneering research but needs partners from the private sector.

“Developing cutting-edge technology is only one part of the process,” he said. “It must be transferred into the marketplace.”

Ringer said NREL has developed policies that allow selected start-up companies to bring in their equipment and set it up at NREL and work with NREL scientists to speed up the innovation development process.

“NREL has a wealth of assets to tap into as do all of the federal laboratories,” he said. “They’re all out there to be used by the people who want to come in and do the work.

“If you come with the right mindset and understand exactly what it is you want to do, the labs are a tremendous asset and we want to partner with you,” he said.

The labs are already having a big impact on the state, amounting to $1.5 billion last fiscal year, according to Scott Sternberg, representing CO-Labs. Sternberg said the impact of federal laboratories was about $100 million in Larimer County alone in fiscal year 2010.

The technology transfer fair was hosted by the  Agricultural Research Service (ARS), the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS), the U.S. Forest Service, NREL and the Center for Disease Control.

Judy Lavelle, CDC health communications specialist, said planning for the tech transfer fair took about six months “to create a forum where the private sector could meet in one day all the (local) agencies.”

“Having an event like this gives us a forum to show the collaboration that goes on all day long – all year long – both working together between agencies and with the private sector,” she said.

“We do a lot of research, but we need the private sector to bring it to commercialization. That’s why we need each other.”

Sponsors of the tech transfer fair included The Rocky Mountain Innosphere, CSU Ventures, Colorado BioScience Association, CO-Labs and the Northern Colorado Business Report.

The BioWest Conference features keynote speakers Ginger Graham of Harvard Business School and past president of Amylin Pharmaceuticals, and Mike Huckman - former CNBC biopharma and medical device industry reporter. The one-day event is attended by more than 500 industry leaders, government representatives, executives, researchers, investors and entrepreneurs. The Venture Showcase finalists present their technologies and business plans to a live audience and a panel of bioscience experts and venture capitalists. The winner, announced at the end of the conference day, will receive a $7,500 cash prize.

• Flashback Technologies is developing and commercializing a software platform which enables immediate, noninvasive detection of the risk for cardiovascular collapse, as well as monitoring the effectiveness of fluid resuscitation therapy.
• KromaTiD has developed diagnostic tools to detect defects and damage to human chromosomes called inversions, which play a key role in cancer and developmental disorders.
• VetDC is a veterinary biotechnology company that leverages human biomedical technologies to address serious unmet medical needs in companion animals. The company’s lead candidate is a novel anti-cancer drug for dogs.
• Sophono has developed the world’s first non-percutaneous, implantable, bone-anchored hearing device. The company’s Alpha 1 System eliminates the problematic abutment of other devices by using magnets to securely affix the external sound processor to a titanium implant.

We are proud to be associated with the management teams and technologies that have achieved this recognition in a competitive selection process. It is rewarding to know that CID4’s bridge funding and management assistance has contributed to helping company management remain focused on their development plans. The technologies embodied in the six finalists demonstrate the depth of innovation that is taking place in Colorado life science companies. CID4 remains committed to assisting the life science cluster achieve economic development through innovation advancement.

A Colorado State University research team has developed advanced materials and technologies to create biocompatible surfaces that prevent biofouling and facilitate healthy incorporation into the body. The technology utilizes natural therapeutic agents that are integrated onto the surface of permanently implanted medical devices or built into the material using biodegradable linkers for short term applications. These materials mitigate detrimental biofouling processes directly at the tissue contacting interface of the medical device.

Please click here for an executive summary of the project.

Advisor Characteristics

We are actively recruiting advisors to participate in discussions aimed at identifying the key customer problem solved by the technology and the appropriate business model to bring it to market. We are looking for expertise from the blood and biocompatible materials industries.

If you or someone you know would be a good Advisor for this project, please send Eric Gricus, Eric@InnovationCenteroftheRockies.com an email with a resume.

He will receive the award at the Merial-NIH National Veterinary Scholars Symposium hosted by Colorado State’s College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences Aug. 2-5 in Fort Collins.

For more than 30 years, Hoover has been an innovator in his field of pathology and the study of infectious diseases such as feline leukemia and chronic wasting disease. The university has honored his career with the title of University Distinguished Professor – one of only a dozen at CSU at any one time.

“He’s really a pioneer,” said Dr. Gregg Dean, Hoover’s former student who is now his department head in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology. “He uses cutting-edge technology but also traditional methods. It’s his ability to blend those two that allows him to comprehensively address how we can mitigate a disease within a population.

“It is a real source of pride for the entire college that someone from our group here at CSU has been selected as an outstanding contributor in veterinary medical research.”

Research in the Hoover laboratory led to development of the first successful and most widely used FeLV vaccine, now used to immunize cats worldwide against leukemia-causing virus. In addition to studying prevention of the disease, Hoover also examined how to identify at-risk cats and how the disease is transmitted to improve understanding of managing diseases in populations.

More recently, his research has focused on prions or misfolded proteins that cause such diseases as chronic wasting disease and how the diseases are transmitted among deer, moose and elk – research that could further understanding of Alzheimer’s and other human diseases. He is developing and evaluating more sensitive tests for chronic wasting disease – including the potential to test for infection in live animals, animal products and the environment. Hoover’s laboratory is also working on a vaccine for CWD. This work is funded by Denver-based Morris Animal Foundation and by the National Institutes of Health.

“Developing this test may eventually lead to a more rapid and sensitive test for CWD,” Hoover has said. “Just as significantly, it may lead to a substantial gain in our understanding of how prions spread, survive in natural habitats, and impact animal and public health.”

About the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges

The Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges or AAVMC is a nonprofit membership organization working to protect and improve the health and welfare of animals, people and the environment by advancing academic veterinary medicine.

Prieto, an associate professor, will receive the award at the end of July in a White House ceremony. She is one of 96 scientists who will receive the award and the only one from Colorado State University in 2012. She was nominated by the National Science Foundation.

“Dr. Prieto and her team embody the spirit of enterprise and complex problem-solving at Colorado State University, with research focused on devising solutions on a global scale,” said President Tony Frank. “It’s particularly notable that her students have been a key piece to her discoveries, learning from one of today’s leading scholars while also gaining remarkable experience in research and creating spinoffs in renewable technologies.”

“We are proud of Amy and the faculty in the College of Natural Sciences whose innovations are making a difference in people’s lives,” said Jan Nerger, dean of the College of Natural Sciences at CSU.

“Discoveries in science and technology not only strengthen our economy, they inspire us as a people,” President Obama said in a White House statement. “The impressive accomplishments of today’s awardees so early in their careers promise even greater advances in the years ahead.”

In 2009, Prieto co-founded Prieto Battery Inc., a company expected to commercialize a non-toxic battery technology up to 1,000 times more powerful,10 times longer lasting and cheaper than traditional batteries. The development of this technology could revolutionize the transportation, communication and energy storage industries. Prieto co-founded the company with Cenergy, which is the commercialization arm of the university’s Clean Energy Supercluster.

The company aims to produce lithium ion batteries based on tiny or nanostructured materials on a mass scale. How it works: Using a process called electrodeposition, Prieto deposits or grows a novel anode material onto a high surface area copper foam or as nanowires. The anode is then used as an electrode for the electrodeposition of polymers, organic materials, that coat the anode and conduct lithium ions but keep the anode and cathode electrically separated. The separation is important for keeping the battery from shorting. The cathode material is added, and the result is a three-dimensional battery.

The nanowires that make up the anode cover a surface area that is 10,000 times greater than a traditional battery. By comparison, roughly 1,000 nanowires could fit in the width of a human hair.

Prieto also continues to focus her research on developing methods for making nanoscale materials that have applications in solar cells, lithium-ion batteries and hydrogen storage.

Prieto has won numerous awards for her scientific discoveries. In 2011, the Colorado Cleantech Industry Association honored her and three other CSU researchers as “Research Rockstars.” She also was named the 2011 American Chemical Society ExxonMobil Solid State Chemistry Faculty Fellow – a prestigious honor given to one scientist who is chosen each year out of a national field. She joined Colorado State in 2005.

 Source: http://www.news.colostate.edu

This past Friday I drove up to Ft. Collins to check out the entrepreneurial scene in Northern Colorado. I did a quick tour of the Rocky Mountain Innosphere, which is a non-profit formed to accelerate the success of startups in the region. The Innosphere has hired new leadership and will be a meaningful resource to the entrepreneurs in the area. I plan to keep in touch.

The hidden gem of the trip was the tour of the CSU Engines Lab. Lab Co-Director Dr. Morgan DeFoot gave us a fascinating tour of the lab and showed us some of the intellectual property that was developed at the facility. More specifically, it was interesting to see how innovation in clean-tech differed from that in the software world.

Incremental Efficiencies vs. Market Disruption

As someone who invests primarily in software, I’m always looking for the product and team that is going to change the market. Market-changers are few and far between, and most of the time I get pitches focused on building a slightly different, yet better mouse trap: “Foursquare with automatic check-ins”, “Pinterest for pet lovers” or whatever other improvement you can think of. At High Country Venture we try and steer clear of software with incremental technology.

On the other hand, the CSU Engines Lab is all about creating efficiencies to the current infrastructure. A slight change in the efficiency of a disel engine can be worth billions in cost savings and have a significant environmental impact. Unlike software engineers who start from a blank slate these engineers are improving the current system. While this may not work in software, it’s a great model for clean-tech.

Why Does Incremental Innovation Work in Clean-Tech?

• It really comes down to distribution and switching cost.
• Most of natural gas is pumped using giant 2-stroke engines.
• Ninety four percent of two and three wheelers in India are powered by 2-stroke engines, each producing 6.5 times more harmful emissions that a 4-stroke would produce.
• Around 3 billion people use open fire to cook most of their meals, causing sever health conditions and pollution

The massive distribution of the energy markets makes an incremental changes extremely powerful. The folks at CSU Engine Lab are laser focused on use cases with large existing network, ultimately making a huge impact with one modification.

When it comes to physical infrastructure it is more efficient to improve vs replace. Financially speaking, physical infrastructure has already been recorded under capex and amortized over a set of years. What this means is that there is a specific lifecycle for things like engines, and most companies will elect to repair over replace. This means that retrofitting the existing infrastructure will have more of an immediate impact than attempting to build a new network. We’re talking about the switching cost. This is very different from the software world, where the switching cost from Sugar CRM to Salesforce only takes a few man hours. More…

The biologically enhanced implant material created by Professor Susan James and BioPoly LLC of Fort Wayne, Ind., is designed to allow active adults to seek joint repair at an earlier age and thus reduce their pain sooner. The CSU-related patents were licensed to BioPoly by CSU Ventures, the technology transfer office for the university.

“This success will enhance our reputation to show that what begins as fundamental research eventually reaches the clinic,” said James, now department head of Mechanical Engineering at Colorado State and formerly founding director of CSU’s School of Biomedical Engineering. “This partial resurfacing implant at least puts off a total knee replacement for this patient, which is more expensive and a more difficult recovery.

“It’s really exciting,” said an elated James. “To relieve someone’s pain is just really cool.”

The first patient to receive the implant said they were in pain crossing their legs or walking up stairs or taking on anything that required their knee to be at an angle, according to BioPoly’s announcement earlier this month. (For more information, go to biopolyortho.com.) Since the surgery, the patient reported that the pain completely disappeared and that they began bicycling four weeks after surgery.

The BioPoly RS Partial Resurfacing Knee Implant used in the patient is the first knee device made from a proprietary biomaterial specifically created for favorable interaction with joint tissues, BioPoly officials said.

At Colorado State, James has spent much of the last 17 years developing the material, which combines polymer science with biomedical engineering to create a new material that may allow human joints to survive much longer than current technology allows.

She developed material that has improved wear-resistance over the conventional bearing material commonly used in total joint prostheses resulting from the infusion of a glycosaminoglycan. Glycosaminoglycan, found within the knee and hip joints of the body, lubricates normal joints and reduces frictional forces on contacting surfaces. The new joint implant material provides a self-lubricating surface, and the end result could be that the patient would have a longer lasting joint implant, reducing the risk for revision surgery.

The BioPoly RS material is made from hyaluronic acid, a glycosaminoglycan, (“Bio”) and ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene (“Poly”). This combination allows the implants to support anatomical loads and more closely mimic the stiffness and hydrophilic properties of cartilage than other orthopedic materials.

The next step, James said, is developing similar materials for cardiovascular usage such as heart valve leaflets and synthetic vascular grafts, where the “poly” component of the material provides durability while the “bio” component prevents blood clotting or thrombus formation.

Early tests have shown the material James and her team created doesn’t cause blood to clot. She recently received $36,000 to pursue that research from the Bioscience Discovery Evaluation Grant program through the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade with matching funds from CSU and Schwartz Biomedical, an Indiana-based orthopedic company, and the parent company of BioPoly LLC.

James credits these public private partnerships and others for the successful implants. Supporting grants have also come from the state of Indiana and a technology business incubator, the Northeast Indiana Innovation Center.

“It really was all of those partners together and a decade of work that got us to the first implant,” James said. “We also educated a bunch of students along the way - undergraduate students helping in the lab and graduate students who did their research on this.”

Courtesy of Colorado State University News & Information.

About BioPoly

BioPoly LLC is an orthopedic implant company located in Fort Wayne, Ind. The company is developing and manufacturing products for use in sports medicine, orthopedics and spinal markets.

About the School of Biomedical Engineering and the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Colorado State

As the first bioengineering program in the state, Colorado State’s School of Biomedical Engineering has offered master’s and doctoral degrees since 2007 and coursework for more than 11 years. Last year, it began the first bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering in Colorado. The multidisciplinary school trains students in the development of innovative products to improve the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases and also to help improve overall health and patient rehabilitation. The program is a collaboration among four colleges encompassing 50 faculty members from 14 departments: College of Engineering, College of Applied Human Sciences, College of Natural Sciences and College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.

The Department of Mechanical Engineering’s faculty and students perform applied research in health, energy and other engineering areas that have global impact. Examples include James’ new medical implant materials and the new thin-film solar panels being manufactured by Abound Solar. Mechanical engineering continues to grow in popularity and is now the fifth largest undergraduate major at CSU. Like James, many of the mechanical engineering faculty are also members of the School of Biomedical Engineering.

About CSU Ventures

CSU Ventures is dedicated to the protection, management and transfer of Colorado State University innovations and intellectual property to the private and public sectors for the benefit of society. With specialized expertise in patenting, licensing and entrepreneurship, CSU Ventures serves as a resource not only to faculty and researchers but also to industry, entrepreneurs and investors seeking to engage with the University.

“It is a tremendous privilege to serve as the dean of any college, but it is truly a privilege to serve as dean of a veterinary college,” said Dr. Perryman. “We serve society every day of every week in clinical services, diagnostic testing, education, discovery and outreach. We deliver something of value every day to the people whom we serve.”

During Dr. Perryman’s tenure as dean, the College has seen prodigious growth in research expenditures, endowment values, and educational opportunities.Since 2001, the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences:

• More than doubled total expenditures ($66.6 million in 2001 to $125 million in 2011).
• Quadrupled CVMBS endowment values (from $15.6 million to $61.5 million).
• Exceeded CVMBS Campaign for Colorado State goal of $100 million, raising $133 million of $500 million university-wide goal.
• Has consistently ranked in the top three of 28 schools and colleges of veterinary medicine in the United States in peer rankings published in the U.S. News & World Report.
• Has ranked first or second in extramurally funded research in its peer group.
• Added additional degree programs including the conjoint DVM/MBA degree program with the College of Business; conjoint DVM/MPH degree program in partnership with the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center; improved and relaunched the DVM/PhD degree program; established a new undergraduate degree in biomedical sciences; and a new Master of Science degree in toxicology and environmental medicine (partner institutions in Japan and soon Taiwan).
• Added major new facilities including the Bio-Environmental Hazards Research Building, Regional Biocontainment Laboratory, and Equine Reproduction Laboratory facilities on the Foothills Campus; Flint Animal Cancer Center, Gail Holmes Equine Orthopaedic Research Center, Equine Force Plate Building, and Diagnostic Medicine Center on the South Campus; and renovated and added to the Dean’s Office in the Anatomy/Zoology Building, and added a study lounge to the Microbiology Building on the Main Campus.
• Has been reconfigured from seven departments into four, and new department heads hired.

Dr. Stetter to take reins July 1

“Dr. Perryman has been an excellent steward of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences,” said Dr. Stetter. “In the short time that I have been here, I’ve developed great respect for what he has been able to accomplish, especially given the funding challenges he has faced. His leadership of and advocacy for the College have helped to steer it through some difficult financial times while maintaining a strong and steady course supporting and expanding existing programs, and discovering and developing new opportunities.”

In his retirement, Dr. Perryman will continue to be involved with veterinary medicine as a consultant in management as well as veterinary pathology. He also plans on devoting more time to developing his talents as a banjo player and photographer. He and his wife, Shirley, who is a registered dietician with Colorado State University Food Science and Human Nutrition Extension, plan on adding a few trips to their calendar as well to visit their daughters and grandchildren.

“It’s hard to believe that 11 years has flown by,” said Dr. Perryman. “That’s 11 crops of undergraduate, graduate and DVM students. I feel good about what we have been able to accomplish: new buildings, growing endowments, a strong campaign, laboratories and excellent research teams, and all our combined degree programs, but especially the DVM/MBA which I had tried to start at North Carolina but was able to successfully implement here.”

Congratulations to Dr. Perryman on close to 11 years as Dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences and best wishes for your endeavors in the years to come.

Contact: Emily Wilmsen

E-mail: Emily.Wilmsen@colostate.edu

Phone: (970) 491-2336

DENVER, CO (PRWEB) June 18, 2012

Colorado’s public universities are teaming with the Colorado Cleantech Industry Association’s newest program to offer executive training in clean technology ventures to individuals outside of the industry. The Cleantech Fellows Institute addresses a simple but bothersome problem: not enough seasoned executives in the cleantech industry. The objective of the program is to help experienced entrepreneurs and executives accelerate their transition into the cleantech sector, stimulating new venture formation, job creation and growth of the cleantech industry.

The Cleantech Fellows Institute is the first of its kind with a national focus and is accepting applications now through July 27. The program will begin in September and combines seminars, lectures, lab visits, capstone and other business planning projects within the university settings at Colorado School of Mines, Colorado State University and the University of Colorado.

“Providing introductions to the national cleantech eco-system, world-class technology and a strategic understanding of the industries within cleantech to seasoned entrepreneurs is critical to venture formation,” said Cleantech Fellows Institute Director Wayne Greenberg. “Our unique partnerships and collaborations with the university and research community in Colorado makes the state an ideal location to promote, build and grow a successful clean technology startup.”

The technologies used to develop the venture-backed companies are emerging from research laboratories at the three universities and the Department of Energy’s (DOE) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Targeted executives are those who have built successful companies in different sectors such as aerospace, biotechnology and enterprise technology.

“CU’s research laboratories are developing sophisticated, clean technologies with significant market potential,” said David N. Allen, CU’s Associate Vice President for Technology Transfer. “Combined with the leadership expertise of the executives coming into the Cleantech Fellows Institute, we believe these technologies have a high potential for success in the commercial world.”

“The Colorado School of Mines prides itself on educational programs based on cutting-edge emerging technologies and on real-world collaboration with leading business people as part of our instructional offering,” said Will Vaughan, Director, Technology Transfer at Colorado School of Mines. “Partnering with the Cleantech Fellows Institute gives us another opportunity to work at the nexus of academia and entrepreneurship.”

The key to the program’s success will be the executives’ exposure to commercially-ready technologies from Colorado sources. Working with the universities and energy laboratories, as well as a team of cleantech industry insiders, the executives will develop a deep understanding of the technologies being developed at each institution. Each executive will select a technology that sparks their interest and plan a capstone project to present in January 2013.

“As CSU’s chief advocate for research activities and the promotion of CSU technology into the marketplace, I am excited to be a part of this cleantech era of technology development and commercialization,” said Bill Farland, Vice President of Research at Colorado State University. “CSU is working to ensure that our most significant innovations are getting out into the marketplace to the people who need them and our partnership with the Fellows Institute supports that mission.”

The Cleantech Fellows Institute was created by the Colorado Cleantech Industry Association and is supported by NREL and Advanced Energy Economy (AEE), a national business organization of which CCIA is a founding chapter.

Information on how to apply for the program is located at cleantechfellows.com. Click here for original article.

About Cleantech Fellows Institute

The Cleantech Fellows Institute is an exclusive program designed to facilitate the creation of venture-backed clean technology companies. The CFI will educate a highly select set of proven executives from across the country, and from a wide variety of industry sectors, that are interested in making the transition to cleantech. For more information, visit http://www.cleantechfellows.com

About Colorado Cleantech Industry Association

The Colorado Cleantech Industry Association (CCIA) represents the interests of the state’s cleantech industry. Its mission is to further establish Colorado as a world leader in clean technology by providing representation and advocacy, a unified voice, relevant programming and capacity development. For more information, visit http://www.coloradocleantech.com.

Click here for additional information.

“KromaTiD’s novel technology provides an exciting and important new tool to researchers and clinicians to detect unique changes in DNA, allowing them to detect various diseases quickly and accurately,” said Lauren Costantini, Ph.D., Vice President of Therapeutics and Device Development at CID4. “CID4’s capital and management resources will assist with the initial launch of this groundbreaking research tool, and allow KromaTiD to accelerate the development of clinical diagnostics.” 

KromaTiD’s proprietary technology enables the imaging of individual strands within a chromosome, giving researchers and geneticists the unique ability to detect inverted DNA segments (inversions). Chromosomal inversions, which can be inherited or caused by ionizing radiation or mutagens, are genetic abnormalities known to be associated with cancers and developmental disorders. 

However, because inversions occur within individual chromosomes, they have been difficult or impossible to detect by conventional imaging, array or sequencing methods. KromaTiD’s technology represents the first genome-wide inversion discovery and detection platform. The company’s research tools increase the resolution of inversion detection by at least 10-fold over current approaches, enabling new areas of disease research and ultimately a new class of clinical diagnostic tests. 

“KromaTiD is an outstanding example of the innovative life science companies that are driving economic development in Colorado, and we are pleased to be able to add them to our portfolio,” said Kevin M. Smith, President and CEO of CID4. 

“KromaTiD’s inversion discovery and detection technology has been in beta testing since late 2011. N¬ow with our partnership with CID4, we are excited to begin our product launch providing these unique tools to biomedical researchers worldwide,” said Christopher Tompkins, Ph.D., President and CEO of KromaTiD. “Perhaps most exciting is that our platform has applications far beyond just detecting a single type of mutation and is truly a next generation approach to chromosome imaging and diagnostic testing.”

The research of Brian Geiss, Assistant Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology and Susan Keenan, Associate Professor and Director of the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Northern Colorado, appears this week online in the peer-reviewed Journal of Virology.

West Nile and dengue fever are vector-borne viral diseases – pathogens that can be transferred from an insect to a human - in a family of viruses known as the flaviviruses. The National Institutes of Health considers a number of flaviviruses priority pathogens because they cause life-threatening illness with few drugs or vaccines available and have the potential to be used as biological weapons.

More than two billion people are at risk globally of infection by dengue virus, and West Nile virus is endemic in 47 of the 48 lower United States. Dengue virus has re-emerged in southern Florida and Hawaii over the past few years. Worldwide, as many as 50 million dengue infections occur each year causing roughly 20,000 to 30,000 deaths.

Geiss and Keenan are developing a drug that can bind to a protein critical for viral replication and block the protein’s function. The viral protein forms a structure on the genome called a “cap” that helps the virus make its replication proteins and protects the viral genome from being degraded in cells. Without this cap structure the virus can’t make the proteins it needs to replicate and the viral genome will be destroyed by the cell.

The researchers screened large chemical libraries for molecules that inhibited this enzyme, then used computer modeling to identify molecules that were better able to bind the viral protein. One of the molecules they found was able to reduce virus replication in cells by more than 1,000-fold.

More work is ahead to improve the effectiveness of the drug now that they’ve confirmed it works in cells against several different viruses, Geiss said. Geiss and Keenan have filed a provisional patent with CSU Ventures to commercialize the technology.

“We’re in the process of testing these drugs against a number of different flaviviruses and trying to improve how well it works in animal models, so there’s a lot more work to get it to the point where it would be used as an investigational new drug,” Geiss said. “However, this is an exciting new finding that has the potential to reduce the suffering caused by these serious pathogens.”

Geiss’ and Keenan’s research is supported by the Rocky Mountain Regional Center of Excellence at Colorado State University – one of only 10 NIH supported centers nationwide aimed at developing novel therapeutics and diagnostics against emerging infectious diseases.

“These results indicate that VDC-1101 may be a powerful and convenient new therapeutic option for treating lymphoma in companion animals.”

The safety and efficacy of an every three-week administration schedule of single agent VDC-1101 was evaluated for the treatment of canine lymphoma in a previously completed animal study (n=21 subjects). VDC-1101 demonstrated substantial antitumor activity in dogs with both treatment-naïve and refractory lymphoma when administered on an every three-week schedule. Adverse events were generally mild to moderate and reversible.

Data will be presented on May 31^st by Dr. Douglas Thamm, Associate Professor of Oncology at Colorado State University’s Flint Animal Cancer Center. “We are very encouraged by the results of this analysis, given the high unmet need for novel, effective veterinary anti-cancer agents, particularly in the refractory setting,” stated Dr. David Vail, Professor of Oncology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine. “These results indicate that VDC-1101 may be a powerful and convenient new therapeutic option for treating lymphoma in companion animals.”

About VetDC, Inc. VetDC, Inc., a Colorado State University startup headquartered in Fort Collins, Colorado, is a veterinary biotechnology company focused on in-licensing, developing and commercializing novel biotechnologies to address serious unmet medical needs in companion animals. In 2011, the company secured seed funding from the Colorado Institute for Drug, Device and Diagnostic Development (CID4). For more information on VetDC, please visit www.vet-dc.com.

Contacts

VetDC, Inc.
Steven J. Roy, 303-859-2072
President & CEO

Click here for additional details.

A new wheat variety is making waves on the High Plains--amber waves.

Denali is a hard red winter wheat variety with a Colorado heritage that has the potential for top dryland and irrigated yields in Colorado and throughout the High Plains.

Breeders at the Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station first identified the particularly promising wheat cross in 2005 during a stripe rust epidemic in Colorado. "This particular cross was really interesting, it showed a very high level of stripe rust resistance overall," explained Scott Haley, Colorado State University breeder. "I recall my crew scratching their heads, wondering why I wanted so many lines selected from this cross. We began cooperative testing with Kansas State University in trials out in western Kansas. Hatcher is a variety that has done well in western Kansas and this one was showing to be about 8 percent or so better than Hatcher."

In 2010, Colorado submitted the experimental Denali line to the Southern Regional Performance Nursery for testing in plots from Texas to South Dakota. The breeders found that it did exceptionally well in western Kansas.

Haley explained Denali's parentage traces back to a Texas A&M University variety, TAM111, and another unreleased CSU experimental line with parentage similar to Hatcher. In preliminary tests, Colorado breeders saw that it showed resistance to stripe rust and Hessian fly. While stripe rust is a significant problem in Colorado, Hessian fly is not and Haley knew growers in parts of Kansas were looking for varieties with that resistance. Denali also had excellent test weights, straw strength and good milling quality with average baking quality. Even with its taller plant stature compared to varieties such as Hatcher and Ripper, severe lodging of Denali was only seen under extremely high yielding irrigated conditions of above 130 bushels per acre.

Denali's story, though, isn't just that it's a new wheat variety with promise for the particular needs of High Plains farmers. It's a great example of how public wheat breeders continue to work together for the benefits of the wheat farmers in their states.

Cooperation

In recent years, with the rush to develop a biotech wheat from private wheat breeding programs, the climate of wheat breeding has changed. Public wheat breeding programs once traded varietal lines or germplasm freely. For example, if a breeder in Oklahoma discovered a variety with promise for Kansas wheat producers, he would share it with the Kansas wheat breeders, and vice versa.

"Prior to 10 or 20 years ago, it was common for a public university in development of a wheat variety to look to other states, maybe share some seed of an advanced line, test that line in the state or maybe even share germplasm or parent lines," explained Daryl Strouts, executive director of the Kansas Wheat Alliance.

But today some public breeding programs are signing collaborative agreements with private companies for the benefit of their wheat breeding programs. That means that those varietal lines and germplasms now have new value, especially in public programs that are capturing royalties from seed sales for investment back into their efforts.

"When university-developed wheat varieties started to be released with royalties attached, it shook up the system; a value was established," Strouts said. "If many universities had a hand in the development of a wheat variety, there was no mechanism in place to share that value," he explained.

Now many, if not all, state wheat breeding programs have some sort of organization or process to market and commercialize public wheat varieties, Strouts explained. In Kansas, that's the Kansas Wheat Alliance. In Colorado that's the Colorado Wheat Research Foundation.

And together, they are marketing Denali.

Strouts explained that KWA and the CWRF have a contract that allows KWA to license Denali to seed growers in the state of Kansas, sharing those royalties with CWRF. "Without this system, we would not have Denali in western Kansas," Strouts said. "It wasn't practical for CWRF to release a variety into Kansas and oversee its increase and use. This gives western Kansas farmers access to a really good variety and another choice out there. We'll see more of this in the future."

Strouts said that marketing groups like KWA, CWRF and Oklahoma Genetics Inc. have started looking over varieties in each other's public breeding programs for those wheat varieties that may have a better fit in another state and creating more marketing agreements like Denali's.

While the bulk of the royalties from Denali sales will go back to CWRF--as the variety's developer--a part does stay in Kansas for use in its public program. Strouts said another portion will go into a regional research fund that public breeders in Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas will be able to tap into for regional varietal testing and other projects.

As a breeder, Haley said royalty funds are helping public breeding programs like Colorado's invest in new plot combines, lab equipment and more.

"It's only been the last 10 to 12 years that those royalties have really started to bring money back into our program," Haley said. And they're starting to help offset some of the loss in federal and state funding for research.

Strouts said in Kansas, that the penny and a half per pound of royalties farmers pay for certified seed are helping bring public wheat breeders the tools they need to be innovative, like a new planter equipped with GPS or the new greenhouses at Hays, Kan.

More importantly, agreements like the one between Kansas and Colorado keeps the lines of access open to both public breeding programs.

Growers win when breeders have access

Haley said as a public wheat breeder continual access to germplasms from colleagues in the public sector is critical. "I went looking into the last 40 years of wheat breeding, looking at the varieties that were released and trying to figure out their immediate crossing parents," Haley said. "The question I wanted to answer was how much came from other sources, whether public or private? I estimated that about 40 to 60 percent of any university's varieties came from parents from their own programs and the rest came from somewhere else. The exchange of germplasm over time is clear. The benefits from free and open exchange of germplasm have been tremendous."

Read full story here.

A device built by Chuck Henry, a chemistry professor, working in tandem with John Volckens, associate professor in Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences, takes only minutes to determine whether someone has been exposed to high levels of airborne metals.

A new paper on the research appears this month in the journal Analytical Chemistry.

“We hope to be able to understand what tasks and/or locations in a particular job have the highest exposure,” Henry said. “Millions of U.S. workers are exposed to heavy metals, and if we can identify these exposures in a cost-effective manner, then we should be able to help mitigate the problem and protect the health of our industrial workforce.”

How it works: The researchers first collect an air sample onto a filter and then, using a hole punch, remove a small portion of the sample for analysis. This sample is placed onto their new technology, called a Paper-based Analytical Device (PAD), which tells them how much of a certain heavy metal was present. The PAD is roughly the size of a quarter and made using wax printed onto filter paper. The wax is patterned into a “circuit” that directs the collected sample through a series of channels and into various “reaction zones.” Each reaction zone contains a tiny amount of chemical reagent that changes color when specific metals are present. These color changes are detectable to the naked eye and can be quantified using a digital camera or a simple desktop scanner.

“Although our PADs are about the size of a quarter, they actually cost less than a nickel each,” Volckens said. “They’re simple enough that we can collect samples in the field and analyze them on site in a matter of minutes. Other methods take weeks to process samples and cost hundreds of dollars per measurement.”

Initial studies in industrial areas have focused on copper, nickel and iron, which can be toxic when inhaled or ingested at high levels. Next up are tests with lead and cadmium, Henry said.

The scientists are working with the CSU Research Foundation to commercialize the invention.

Henry is co-founder and CEO of Advanced MicroLabs LLC, which was formed to commercialize a low-cost, rapid “lab-on-a-chip” invention with biomedical and environmental applications. To date, AML has raised more than $3 million in grant funding and is currently working to bring an innovative on-line monitoring sensor to the market in the industrial cleanwater field.

Volckens’ research is aimed at understanding air pollution impacts on human and environmental health and at developing engineering-based solutions to air pollution problems in communities and workplaces worldwide.

-30-

Selected executives from across the nation will join the program. Targeted executives are those who have built successful companies in different sectors such as aerospace, biotechnology and enterprise technology. Executives with more than 20 years of experience, an advanced degree and experience leading a venture-backed start-up company are encouraged to apply. Each candidate must have a strong desire to transition into the cleantech industry through accelerated training, networking and technology exposure.

Colorado is a hub for cleantech. There is an abundance of market-ready research and technology here to drive the success of this program, said Wayne Greenberg, director of the Cleantech Fellows Institute. The executives selected will have access to virtually unlimited resources, build an invaluable national network of cleantech stakeholders and have the opportunity to launch venture backed companies in one of the industrys most innovative and supportive communities.

Were thrilled to be a founder of the CFI and we look forward to working closely with experienced executives who can incorporate fresh ideas into leading successful cleantech start-ups, said Christine Shapard, executive director of Colorado Cleantech Industry Association. This will be the first year of the program and Im confident that it will prove to be one of the nations most practical and motivating programs to advance the cleantech industry.

CFI was created by the Colorado Cleantech Industry Association (CCIA) and is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and Advanced Energy Economy (AEE), a national business organization of which CCIA is a founding chapter. The CFI program builds on a regional program developed by the New England Clean Energy Council, another AEE member, and takes it national in scope.

But fortunately for future surgeons, Hendrickson, 49, director of the CSU veterinary teaching hospital, is using his powers for good by founding SurgiReal products, a new startup company along with Fausto Bellezzo, a Colorado State University vet school surgeon, which produces realistic synthetic skin pads upon which students can practice cutting and suturing.

The SurgiReal pads and body walls include hairs, blood vessels and different layers. Some models are so realistic that they can even bleed if a student hooks an IV of fake blood up to them. Hendrickson's goal is to provide students with the most realistic training model possible and eliminate training on live animals.

"We have a vision that meets the stars," Hendrickson said. "A whole (SurgiReal) body with organs in it."

Initially, the concept was limited to CSU's vet school, but Hendrickson's "ah-ha" moment came at a human simulation conference in San Diego in January where he got a firsthand look at the poor state of other synthetic skin models.

After releasing a video demonstrating SurgiReal products, Hendrickson said they have received inquires from around the globe from vet, nursing and medical schools.

Working with CSU Ventures and Longmont's Hadley and Marion Stuart Foundation, the company is looking to partner with a company for manufacturing, engineering and marketing the product. They hope to have a partner by the end of May and have a full-body prototype complete with organs by the end of the summer.

Hendrickson said it costs about $10 between time and material to make a pad, which will retail for $60-$70.

Monika Lee, 26, is a CSU vet school student who worked in the lab helping develop the SurgiReal synthetic skins as well as cutting on them herself.

She said cutting on the pads is not identical to real flesh, but that it is a fantastic substitute for training purposes.

"I personally think it is great," she said. "I think it really gives a lot of confidence to the user to perform the normal surgeries. That has been extremely beneficial in my case to get through the layers and have all the different consistencies."

Article published by Northern Colorado Business Report.

Bio International Conference Scholarship

Description

Scholarships that cover the $2,295 early registration fee are available to CO bioscience entrepreneurs that have great opportunities to advance their business through conference programs and partnering at the Bio International Convention. By facilitating applicant partnering, OEDIT expects to strengthen the industry presence in Colorado. Scholarships applications will be competitively evaluated based on the expected benefits or conference participation and the resulting impact on the CO bioscience industry.

Only 4 scholarships are available. Click here for application information.

When First Lady Michelle Obama and a passel of schoolchildren recently planted vegetables in the White House kitchen garden, three of five potato varieties plunked into the soil were developed by Colorado State University.

“It feels good to have Colorado potatoes receive this kind of recognition. When I saw it, I thought, ‘That’s pretty great. I won’t argue with that!’” said David “Spudmaker” Holm, a CSU horticulture professor. Holm led development of the three varieties at the White House.

The types of Colorado spuds planted were:

• Sangre, a flavorful red-skinned potato with good boiling and baking qualities that’s known to store well and is named for the Sangre de Cristo Mountains;

• Canela Russet, a popular russet that’s great for baking and whose name, in Spanish, means “cinnamon,” a reference to its warm skin color; and

• Mountain Rose, a specialty potato with red skin and pigmented, light-red flesh that’s high in healthful antioxidants.

All of the potato varieties are available to home gardeners during the spring planting season.

The inclusion of potatoes in the First Garden was notable after a vociferous policy debate last fall. The U.S. Department of Agriculture had proposed a limit on white potatoes and other starchy vegetables in public-school meal programs. The plan was aimed at boosting the variety of veggies served to schoolchildren in an era of increasing childhood obesity. The U.S. Senate scuttled the plan.

“I was thrilled to see potatoes planted in the White House garden. I was really excited after the issue with potatoes in school meals,” said Jim Ehrlich, executive director of the Colorado Potato Administrative Committee, which represents Colorado potato growers. “I feel vindicated. Potatoes had been depicted as the villain, and when you work in this field you take that to heart. We feel like we’re providing a nutritious, healthy source of food.”

Planting in the White House vegetable garden was part of Let’s Move!, the First Lady’s campaign to encourage exercise and healthful eating among children.

Want to talk tubers in Colorado?

Potatoes are tops among all fruits and vegetables grown in Colorado, with $156 million in sales in 2010, according to the Colorado Agricultural Statistics report. That number is expected to jump to more than $250 million in sales when 2011 numbers are crunched, an increase attributed to much higher potato prices due to a smaller nationwide crop last year.

Colorado potato farming is centered in the San Luis Valley, an expanse that sits at 7,500 feet elevation and is ringed by the San Juan and Sangre de Cristo mountains. It is known as the highest and largest commercial agricultural valley in the world. Here, spuds rule.

Last year, 55,000 acres of potatoes were planted in San Luis Valley; that’s nearly 90 square miles. Most of these potatoes are grown for the fresh market, and the vast majority – approaching 90 percent – are varieties developed by CSU.

It takes 14 years to develop a new potato variety through the process of crossbreeding, growing and selecting for desirable traits – then identifying, evaluating and certifying the new cultivar. CSU’s San Luis Valley Research Center, with a potato team of seven people, develops varieties through traditional plant breeding; these potatoes are not genetically modified.

The CSU research team – formally called the Colorado Potato Breeding and Selection Program – works closely with farmers to develop and test successful varieties, said Holm, the project leader (His email name is “spudmkr”).

The team seeks cultivars that will grow vigorously, demonstrate resistance to disease and pests, and require limited fertilizer and fungicide. The CSU potato-breeding program has emphasized environmental sustainability since it began about 60 years ago.

“It’s something we’ve always practiced,” said Holm, project leader for nearly 35 years. “If we can grow a potato without as much nitrogen or as much fungicide, and still produce an acceptable crop, then we’ve made progress. All of our varieties tend to be more sustainable.”

In turn, the Colorado Potato Administrative Committee, representing growers, supports CSU potato research to the tune of about $250,000 a year. This alliance provides critical support for CSU research innovations, and delivers both new knowledge – and new cultivars – that help the Colorado potato industry to thrive.

These days, the potato research team focuses not only on varieties with improved sustainability but on developing cultivars with improved human-health benefits.

The group is particularly interested in pigmented potatoes, with purple and red flesh, that are rich in cancer-fighting polyphenols, carotenoids and other antioxidants.

Mountain Rose, featured in the White House garden, is among these. Another is called Purple Majesty, with deep-purple flesh.

As Mrs. Obama told kids helping in the White House vegetable garden, “Let’s plant!”

For more information http://www.news.colostate.edu/Release/6216

The Center for Drug Discovery, also known as C2D2, supports drug discovery research. It is awarding $216,282 to Colorado researchers in 2012. Including this year’s awards, C2D2 has provided more than $660,000 to 11 drug discovery programs from all major research institutions in Colorado.

Projects selected for funding will benefit Colorado State University’s cancer and cardiometabolic disease research, CU-Boulder’s cancer research, CU-Denver’s cancer research and National Jewish Health’s respiratory disease research.

The 2012 recipients, focus of the program, and grants selected for funding are:

-CSU, Brian McNaughton, “Optimizing Small Molecule Suppression of Mcl-1 Oncogene Expression in Human Cells.” This program focuses on developing a new screening technology that expands researchers’ ability to search for new drugs that can target proteins which are critical in many diseases such as cancer. Instead of identifying compounds that bind the active site of proteins, this technology is capable of identifying small molecules that can affect the behavior of proteins in new ways, which can lead to the development of new therapies for a variety of diseases.

-CSU, Adam Chicco, “Development of novel, selective delta-6 desaturase inhibitors for the treatment of cardiometabolic disease.” This program will identify new drugs to inhibit an enzyme researchers have identified as important during the development of diabetes and cardiovascular disease, which may lead to more effective treatment and prevention of these conditions.

-CU-Boulder, Tad Koch, “Development of a Prodrug for Pancreatic Cancer.” Pancreatic cancer remains a major challenge to treat, and the average five-year survival rate is about 6 percent. This research evaluates a potential new drug to treat aggressive pancreatic cancer in a laboratory.

-CU-Boulder, Tin Tin Su, “A Pipeline of Translation Inhibitors for Oncology.” Treating cancer with two or more anti-cancer agents is more effective than treating it with just a single strategy. This program will use a new test to identify molecules that can be combined with radiation treatment to increase the effectiveness of therapy.

-CU, Xuedong Liu, “Development of Proprietary Mps1 Inhibitors for Lung Cancer Therapeutics.” This research project evaluates the effectiveness of a new lung cancer treatment. Lung cancer is the most common cause of cancer-related death in men and women in the world, leading to 1.3 million deaths annually.
-CU-Denver, Mair Churchill, “Pharmacological inhibition of histone chaperone activity.” Despite recent advances in the treatment of cancer, new approaches are needed. Histone chaperone proteins may play an important role in new treatments. The C2D2 grant will help develop ways to block histone chaperone proteins, which are important in gene expression.
-National Jewish Health, Dennis Voelker: “Novel lipid antagonists of respiratory syncytial virus.” Respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, infects 98 percent of all children before they are two years old. It is a major case of hospitalizations among United States children in the first year of their life. It is difficult to treat RSV, and this project continues to evaluate newly discovered compounds as a new treatment.

Access to a supply of compounds to use in research can be a significant impediment for many biomedical researchers. In addition to funding drug discovery research programs, the Colorado Center for Drug Discovery prepares new compounds that biomedical researchers can use in experiments.

C2D2 was created in 2010 as part of Colorado’s five-year Bioscience Discovery Evaluation Grant Program. The organization is dedicated to providing research support to promising drug discovery related programs in Colorado.

C2D2 recently relocated its operations from CSU Ventures to Colorado State University’s Department of Chemistry, which will allow it to enhance its chemistry support capabilities. As part of the transfer, Professor Robert Williams, a University Distinguished Professor of chemistry, will become the director of C2D2.

By: Travis Knudsen

Faculty of the Colorado State University, government officials, and local business owners all gathered today for the Cenergy Expo to discuss clean energy idea as well as to promote clean-tech job grown across Northern Colorado.

"Energy is a huge component of our economy," said Tim Reeser the Vice President of Colorado State Ventures.  He says that it is important to think about clean energy when considering future jobs across Northern Colorado.

"This is really broadly about how do we look at energy as a community.  How do we look at jobs, and how do we look at new income creation in Colorado.  And then, how do we look at the environment and do the right thing."  He said.

Between 250 and 300 people attended Wednesday's expo.  In its 4th year, lots of discussion took place at the expo about where Colorado stands in comparison to other places across the country with new clean technology and jobs.

"Certainly in some areas we hear people talk about "Priuses-per-person" or "Priuses-per-capita."  We're certainly up there with San Francisco and Silicon Valley.  As a community and a culture I would say we're doing very well but there is still some of our infrastructure that's not there.  We still broadly get the majority of our electrical energy from coal."  Reeser said.

Today's expo gathers together energy experts in research, technology and business to continue to bring Northern Colorado into the future.

"It takes an ecosystem, it takes a village as they say to get companies out and make innovations go.  And so this [expo] is a chance to make sure we gather that village together.  Gather around what needs to be done, positions the village to really help with each of these [energy fields] to make impact, to get these companies out get them into the community get them hiring people get them funded so they can hire people and so we really see this as the gathering of the village and putting the group together to make it happen."  Reeser said.

“As an undisputed leader in the area of boron and carbon chemistry and as an interdisciplinary scientist, for his unwavering commitment to teaching and mentoring students and for his service to CSU and beyond, Professor Steven Strauss clearly deserves recognition by the College of Natural Sciences as a Professor Laureate,” said chemistry department chair Professor Ellen Fisher who nominated Strauss.

The College of Natural Sciences will host Strauss for a lecture at 4:30 p.m. May 4 in the Grey Rock Room of the Lory Student Center. The event is free and open to the public.

Strauss will receive his Professor Laureate award and give a lecture titled, “What is a Pure Compound? - An Impure Chemist Responds.” The lecture, which will include Strauss’ personal and professional experiences, will be preceded by acknowledgement of the college’s 2012 Teaching and Mentoring Award winners.

“In addition to being a world-renown researcher, Steve is widely acknowledged as one of the most effective and popular teachers in the chemistry department,” Fisher said. “He has won four teaching awards during his tenure at CSU.”

Strauss has worked at the university for more than 30 years, acting as a mentor and advisor to numerous students and postdoctoral researchers. He continues to support his students’ careers and future endeavors after graduation.

Professor Laureate is the highest academic title awarded by the college and is intended to honor faculty who have made outstanding contributions to its mission with work in the areas of research, teaching, mentoring, service and outreach.

 
Freeman, who engineered the financial deal for the Innosphere’s new building, has spent the last few months as a CSU Ventures consultant. He had not been able to start immediately at the Innosphere because of an ethics law that prohibits government officials from being employed with private-sector groups in which they were involved in financial dealings within six months.

Now, Freeman appears to be inheriting a solid operation that has benefited from the commitment of Innosphere staffers and board members. But he knows he has more work to do.

Freeman has already taken steps to further develop the organization. With the departure of the Innosphere’s chief operating officer, he has hired Northern Colorado financial services veteran Doug Johnson as vice president for capital access.

Freeman no doubt will draw on his public and private-sector background and four years as an Innosphere board member to aid clean-energy, technology and scientific startups at the Innosphere. His main focus in the coming months will be focus in the coming months will be securing capital for entrepreneurs.

Question: What qualifies you for the position of chief executive officer of the Innosphere?

Answer: I’ve not put together a technology startup. In this case, that’s OK because the skill-set that’s needed here isn’t necessarily being a successful entrepreneur.

This organization in a lot of ways is entrepreneurial. Frankly, I feel like some days it’s as much of a startup as any of the companies we’re working with.

I think what I’m bringing to the table is really strong management skills, a lot of financial experience, fundraising and strategy.

I think in a nonprofit environment, you have to have all those components. We have phenomenal board members, entrepreneurs, advisors, mentors. We’re flooded with great talent.

We don’t need an entrepreneur sitting in this role. What we need in this role is someone who understands how to make the organization successful, how to align it effectively with the clients and what they need and execute.

It’s all about getting stuff done and that’s what I’m good at. I have run a couple companies, but they weren’t product-based; they were consulting.

I understand business development, marketing, finance in a small-company environment, so I can relate to the companies in that regard.

Engineering a product and getting it to market I personally haven’t done, but we have plenty of people who have had that experience.

Really the balance of the prior experiences I bring to the table plus the phenomenal people in our SAGE program, our board members; it takes all of us to effectively run this organization.

Q: What are your plans for the Innosphere this year?

A: Being the former chair of the organization for a number of years, this is not like coming into a new organization. That’s great because I have a pretty good handle on the things we need to work on.

The two main priorities this year are access to capital and doing some really novel and unique things to address that issue for the companies that we work with.

Second is building a tighter relationship with the client companies we have.

Q: How are you going to accomplish those goals?

A: Access to capital is and has been a key issue for all the startups in this region.

We recognize that we have to address this issue in an environment where we’re still recovering. What we’re doing is putting some unique financing tools in place that between CSU and the Innosphere will control access to capital on behalf of a handful of companies we’ll actually invest in.

We’re putting what’s called a “donor pool” together. We’ve committed with CSU to collectively raise $1 million.

That money will be used at that seed stage with investments of roughly $50,000 to $150,000 to get entrepreneurs with good ideas out of the box quickly. That investment takes the form of a convertible note. We would expect down the road to be paid back for that. If the company fails or the idea doesn’t pan out, then we would factor a significant loss into that pool. This is risky capital at that stage.

We’ve been working with large banks, national and regional, to help us conceptualize how we put two different financing pools together.

One would be a debt pool where debt equity would be invested in the company – again, repaid at term.

The second one is really the most important one. It’s called a community development venture capital fund. There’s only about 70 of these in the U.S.; there’s none in Colorado.

We’re taking a leadership role to set the first one up here. The community development venture capital funds are capitalized by banks, typically through the Community Reinvestment Act.

The combination of having the donor pool, the debt instrument and then the venture fund is what will get the companies we work with out of the startup phase and venture-ready.

“What we eat impacts the environment of our intestines – and if we can start to unlock the secrets of how our diets impact colon cancer risk, we’ve learned something very valuable. This study could lend important clues to cancer researchers about how diets impact colon cancer risk and rates,” said Elizabeth Ryan, a cancer researcher at CSU’s Animal Cancer Center.

BENEFIT stands for Bean/Bran Enriching Nutritional Eating For Intestinal Health Trial. Study participants will receive a BENEFIT lunch and snack for 28 days and must complete a dietary food log for each week of the study. A registered dietitian has designed all of the meals. Participants will need to visit the CSU Kendall Anderson Nutrition Center to give test samples throughout the study and meet with study coordinators.

There is no cost to participate in the study, and people who complete all of the requirements will receive one free session of nutritional counseling at the CSU Nutrition Center with a registered dietitian, a $50 value.

To qualify, participants must: - Be a colorectal cancer survivor - Be 18 years old or older - Be a non-smoker - Have no severe food allergies - Not be following a vegetarian diet - Be willing to eat the meals and snacks prescribed for four weeks - Not be taking any medications that could cause inaccurate measurements, such as Bean-O or antibiotics - Have no history of gallstones - Not be pregnant or lactating and do not intend to become pregnant during the study

Participants also will be asked to provide a blood, urine, stool and saliva sample at three separate times during the study.

The study is randomized and placebo-controlled.

For more information about the study, contact Elizabeth Ryan at e.p.ryan@colostate.edu or 970-491-5301 or Erica Borresen at Erica.borresen@colostate.edu or 970-297-4144.

Snowmass wheat is licensed to ConAgra to make Ultragrain flour, a 100-percent whole wheat flour that combines the nutrition and benefits of whole grains with the finished recipe qualities of refined flour. No bleaching and minimal other processing is required to produce a white colored wheat whole grain product.

Ultragrain is the whole grain flour in many packaged foods like pasta, pizza and bread, including the popular Sara Lee Soft & Smooth® whole grain white bread products and Healthy Choice® all-natural entrees. Ultragrain can also be found in Eagle Mills® All-Purpose Flour and Eagle Mills® 100-Percent White Whole Flour.

Ultragrain is also included in many other grocery, school cafeteria and restaurant items, from buns, rolls, tortillas, muffins, and noodles to pizza, waffles, French toast sticks, cookies, pretzels, and snack and cereal bars.

“What is really exciting is that the CSU Wheat Breeding Program is working on several novel non-genetically modified human health traits such as high amylose to improve the next generation of Snowmass even more,” said Darrell L. Hanavan, Executive Director of CWRF.

Snowmass is grown and sold exclusively as a class of certified seed by Colorado Seed Growers Association members licensed by CWRF. Royalties paid to the foundation by certified seed growers from the sale of these varieties are returned to CSU to support continued wheat research and variety development.

Congratulations to Chandrasekaran Venkatachalam for receiving the Innovative Excellence Award.

Patent Plaque Recipients 2010-2011:

U.S. Issued Patents

 College of Engineering

Chandrasekaran Venkatachalam, Dmitriy Moiseev, Cuong Manh Nguyen, Susan James, Min Zhang, Guy Beauregard, Mario Marconi, Przemyslaw Wachulak, Carmen Menoni, Jorge Rocca, Michael Grisham, Brendan Reagan, Walajabad Sampath, Kurt Barth, Robert Enzenroth, Gang Xu, Yanting Wang, Thomas Sale, Timothy Smith, Georgiy Vaschenko, Matthew Viele, Nitin Bharadwaj

College of Natural Sciences

Michael Elliott, Di Xue, David Grainger, Michael Kirby, Christopher Peterson, Charles Henry, Carlos Garcia, Arthur Jamshidi

College of Veterinary Medical and Biomedical Sciences

John Belisle, Mark Jonathan Sartain, Dean Crick, Michio Kurosu

Foreign Issued Patents

College of Engineering

Sue James, Min Zhang, Chandra Venkatachalam, Cuong Manh Nguyen, Dmitriy Moiseev

College of Veterinary Medical and Biomedical Sciences

Robert Handa, Trent Lund, Robert Grieve, Michael McNeil      

College of Liberal Arts and Business   

Bruce Golden, Ralph Switzer, Jr., Bernard Rollin, Carlton Comstock

Special thanks to our sponsors for their generous support.

Platinum

Kilpatrick Townsend

Silver

Faegre Baker Daniels, LLP

Polsinelli Shughart, PC

Bronze

Cochran Freund & Young, LLC

CSU Management Corp.

Dann Dorfman Herrell and Skillman

Lathrop & Gage LLP

Mckee, Voorhees & Sease, PLC

NOCOBIO

Rocky Mountain Innosphere

Sage Law Group

Sheridan Ross, PC

Smith & Hopen, PA

Swanson & Bratschun, LLC

A technology-transfer office, CSU Ventures creates 1.5 startups per $100 million in research funding, Headley said. It formed five startups in 2010, when research spending topped $300 million, according to an Association of University Technology Managers survey.

That metric also has CSU finishing ahead of some other notable institutions, including Dartmouth College and Johns Hopkins University, according to a CSU Ventures analysis of the association's survey.

"We're well above average in terms of how many startups we do based upon the size of research expenditures," Headley said.

CSU Ventures certainly does not create as many startups as an elite institution like MIT, which started 17 companies in 2010. MIT, however, reported $1.4 billion in research spending.

By comparison, the University of Colorado spent nearly $850 million and created nine startups. Johns Hopkins, with nearly $1.5 billion in research spending, started 11 companies.

At CSU, Headley said, "If you look at how big we are, we actually do pretty darn well in terms of the number of companies that we start every year."

But CSU Ventures and other universities must fight for dollars to fund such operations during an era of tight budgets.

CSU President Tony Frank stressed to the audience the importance of federal and state funding for higher education. He considers American research universities as key research and development engines that will help the nation succeed in a 21st century knowledge economy.

"Get involved in those discussions, because they're, I think, critically important not only to Colorado State University, to Northern Colorado, to our state," he told the audience. "I think they're very important to the future of America."

Besides its relative startup success, CSU Ventures has posted impressive numbers in the past five years compared with the previous five years. Inventions have more than doubled and the number of inventors nearly has doubled. Patent applications and licensing agreements have nearly tripled.

New startup companies have more than doubled from nine to 20. Licensing income – dollars from technology licensed by CSU Ventures that goes to the university and inventors – reached more than $8 million the past five years. CSU generated a little over $4 million in licensing income the previous five years.

The awards ceremony audience saw first-hand the success of individual CSU inventors. CSU Ventures awarded multiple inventors from the College of Engineering, College of Veterinary Medical and Biomedical Sciences and College of Natural Sciences for their patents. CSU Ventures also recognized two companies, SurgiReal and Advanced MicroLabs.

SurgiReal's surgical training models help veterinarian and medical students learn surgery fundamentals. The synthetic models look like real skin and organs and even simulate blood loss.

Dean Hendrickson, SurgiReal founder and director of the CSU Veterinary Teaching Hospital, credited CSU Ventures for helping the company get started. CSU Ventures "helped us to take something from an idea and move it to where we are," he said.

Another company, Advanced MicroLabs, created technology to monitor low levels of contaminants in water used in power plants. Corrosion by contaminants can lead to turbine failures that can cost hundreds of millions of dollars to replace.

CSU Ventures also honored V. "Chandra" Chandrasekar, a CSU professor of electrical and computer engineering, with the Award for Innovative Excellence. Chandrasekar collaborated with researchers, faculty and students from CSU and other universities to develop a radar that detects tornadoes earlier than current systems.

Steve Lynn covers technology for the Northern Colorado Business Report. He can be contacted at slynn@ncbr.com or 970-232-3147.

Multiple CSU inventors from the College of Engineering, College of Natural Sciences and College of Veterinary Medical and Biomedical Sciences received awards for patents issued last year and the previous year.

CSU Ventures, the university’s technology-transfer outfit, has helped inventors achieve 165 license agreements over the past five years. That represents a 184-percent increase from the 58 agreements that CSU Ventures fulfilled the previous five years.

CSU Ventures also has helped generate more than $8 million in licensing income during the last five years, an 86-percent increase from the previous five years.

Wednesday’s event was well-attended, with CSU President Tony Frank delivering opening remarks on the importance of technology-transfer offices.
As the nation tries to emerge from the recession and into the future, the U.S economy will require research and development to succeed in a knowledge economy of the 21st century, Frank said.

“That R&D engine is, first and foremost, America’s research universities,” he said.

CSU Ventures also recognized companies started by CSU researchers such as Advanced MicroLabs and SurgiReal.

Advanced MicroLabs has developed technology to monitor low levels of contaminants in water used in electric power plants. Contaminants can cause corrosion, leading to failure of turbines that can cost $200 million to replace.

“This is a very real problem for the electric power generation industry,” CEO Chuck Henry said.

Using SurgiReal’s synthetic surgical training models, beginning and advanced medical and veterinarian students can learn basic surgical techniques without cutting into real tissue. The models mimic skin and organs and even contain vessels that simulate blood loss.

CSU Ventures also recognized Professor Chandrasekaran Venkatachalam with the Award for Innovative Excellence. Venkatachalam has received seven patents and has 25 patent applications pending, CSU Ventures President Todd Headley said.

CSU Ventures, which handles technology transfer for Colorado State, recently honored V. “Chandra” Chandrasekar, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, for his work to create a series of small radars that could revolutionize the way meteorologists detect storms.

The award was presented at CSU Ventures' Technology Transfer Awards Ceremony on February 29. “Professor Chandra is a dedicated faculty member whose work in the area of weather prediction and emergency preparedness is already making a difference with emergency services personnel,” said Todd Headley, president of CSU Ventures. “We are proud to honor him for his innovation.”

CSU Ventures also unveiled a new look and brand to build on its success as a support system for university researchers who are transferring inventions into the marketplace. Branding efforts include the creation of a new logo, website and social media pages.

Previously, the University’s technology transfer and commercialization functions operated under CSU Research Foundation or CSURF, a not-for-profit affiliate of CSU. CSU Ventures - a wholly owned subsidiary of CSURF - is a private, non-profit advocacy arm of the university whose mission is to actively support and promote the transfer of CSU research and innovations into the marketplace to benefit society.

Much of Chandra’s innovation has come from his work as a key player in the National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center for Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere, or CASA – an Engineering Research Center, that is developing a network of radar systems for deployment across the country. He is the leader of the sensing thrust of the project and also the deputy director for CASA. He is the co-Principal Investigator for the CSU-CHILL National Radar facility as well as a member of remote sensing research team in NASA.

The first radar network testbed created from the CASA partnership, called CASA IP-1 radars, were tested for severe weather detection in Oklahoma’s “tornado alley,” which experiences about 22 tornadoes a year. The CASA IP-1 system was designed by researchers, faculty and students from CSU, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, the University of Oklahoma and the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagez. The low-power radar is highly reliable, inexpensive, adaptive and operates collaboratively in a system of similar radars, which has been shown to detect tornadoes earlier than the current state-of-the-art systems.

This year, the team will concentrate its efforts in the Dallas-Fort Worth region – the first time it will be tested in a major metropolitan area.

In 2008, Chandra taught a nationwide audience of broadcast meteorologists a course on dual polarization radars that were developed at CSU. Dual-polarization radar is the latest technology to be used by forecasters to warn the public about developing severe weather and was adopted in 2009 as the new National Weather Service standard.

Dual-polarization works by transmitting and receiving electromagnetic waves at both horizontal and vertical polarization. This technique allows better discrimination of particle shapes, which means more accurate information can be gathered on rain and hail, snowflakes and other particles in clouds.

“We are looking at different ways to reach out to faculty, researchers and the business community to spark conversations, promote technologies and forge new partnerships,” said Todd Headley, President at CSU Ventures.

The new look and website will officially be announced to a large audience on Wednesday as part of the CSU Ventures biennial technology transfer awards ceremony. The event serves to recognize outstanding CSU researchers, inventions and startup companies.

CSU Ventures a wholly owned CSURF subsidiary

Previously, the University’s technology transfer and commercialization functions operated under CSU Research Foundation (CSURF), a not-for-profit affiliate of CSU. CSU Ventures - a wholly owned subsidiary of CSURF - is a private, non-profit advocacy arm of the university whose mission is to actively support and promote the transfer of CSU research and innovations into the marketplace to benefit society.

“We serve as a resource not only to CSU faculty and researchers, but also to industry, entrepreneurs, and investors seeking to further research or commercialize a technology,” said Headley.

CSU Ventures also encompasses three enterprise arms – NeoTrex, MicroRx and Cenergy – which are primarily focused on commercializing technologies developed within CSU’s academic Superclusters of cancer, infectious disease and clean energy.

Between 2007 and 2011, CSU Ventures has assisted in the creation and growth of 20 startup companies, the majority of which are Colorado based. That compares with a total of nine companies created in the previous five-year period.

“In these past five years with an increased focus on technology transfer, our metrics are up significantly. We’re clearly having an impact in Colorado as well, where 90 percent of our startup companies are based and 70 percent of the technologies we’ve licensed are based.” “It is a real compliment to the world-class CSU researchers,” said Headley.

Other highlights for CSU Ventures and university inventors:

• 515 inventions – up 132 percent from the 222 inventions during the previous five year (FY2002-FY2006) period


• 627 patent applications – a 170 percent increase from the 232 applications during the previous five-year period


• 165 license agreements – a 184 percent increase from 58 agreements during the previous five years


• $8.22 million in licensing income – an 86 percent increase from $4.42 million during the previous five years

As Colorado’s only land-grant institution, CSU faculty and students create new companies and jobs critical to Colorado’s economy, prepare students for the workforce and enable innovation. The university has influenced state and national economic development activities and enacted major initiatives to improve partnerships in the community and encourage entrepreneurship.

Under the new law, the first inventor to file a patent application wins priority for the filed invention, underscoring the importance of timely filing to preserve priority of invention. University inventors, for example, should understand the elevated burden that the Act places on them to actively work with their technology transfer office (in our case Colorado State University Ventures) to ensure prompt patent application filings to obtain patent claims. Although the act provides a one-year grace period for the inventor to publicly disclose the invention prior to filing, this exception is narrow and the exact scope of this grace period can be uncertain as obviousness is measured under the Act at the time the patent application is filed instead of when the invention was conceived or reduced to practice.

The scope of information that constitutes before art is broadened under the act to include information "otherwise available to the public," a term that has not been defined or tested, but refers to certain disclosures anywhere in the world instead of just in the United States. This prevents inventors from disclosing or selling their inventions overseas without starting the one-year filing clock, after which patent rights are forfeited. It is unclear whether "available to the public" excludes private sales and licenses, previously included, however, inventors should continue to use the same caution until courts have resolved the issue.

An interesting new feature is the allowance of third-party submissions of before art during limited windows of time, encouraging competing inventors to monitor and report any prior art that may be relevant in a pending application.

There no longer is a need for the old "interference proceedings" to determine which of multiple inventors is granted rights if they file at or near the same time, because now the first application always will prevail. To prevent parties from misappropriating the ideas of others, the act establishes actions called "derivation proceedings" that provide certain mechanisms to allow an inventor who files an application after another application, both with substantially the same claim(s), to invalidate the earlier patent filing based on evidence that the invention, although filed first, was actually derived from the later filed invention.  The purpose is to ensure a patent only is granted to an original inventor.

Another notable change includes a controversial new post-grant review process based on a similar procedure used by the European Patent Office. However, this new post-grant review process is expected to result in an explosion of the number of challenges to patents, particularly from large companies attempting to delay or derail start-ups and smaller organizations, including universities. The effect of these possible risks on licensing efforts and investor commitment is yet to be seen. Some speculation has mounted that the perceived risk will delay these deals until the post-grant review period has expired or any initiated reviews have been settled.

 Trade secrets come into the forefront with a new defense under the act that allows an infringer of a patent to continue commercial use of the invention if they were already using it at least one year before the patent filing date or public disclosure by the patentee, whichever occurs first.

 Many interpret this section of the act to encourage trade secrets, as it provides some protection from future infringement claims. Universities have an unusual role in this “prior user rights” defense, insofar as university research is considered “commercial” in order for the defense to be available to them. Yet third parties cannot use the defense at all against a university patent if the patent stemmed from federally funded research (as many do).

Also a benefit to universities, most filing fees for “micro entities” (including universities) are reduced to a 75 percent discount as compared with the large entity fee, lessening the burden of filing for university technology transfer offices.

 All told, only time will tell if there will be significant impact on universities or innovation in general, due to the changes created by the act.

The two findings, which occurred at Colorado State University, are published today in Nature Chemical Biology. The article describes the discovery of an important cell function in the bacterium that causes tuberculosis which allows the bacterium to survive. The researchers also discovered a compound that prevents this cell function.

The bacterium that causes tuberculosis is extremely difficult to kill and current tuberculosis drugs on the market don’t do well to treat it. Six months of multiple antibiotics are generally required to treat tuberculosis in most people, and many current drugs no longer work because of resistant strains of the bacterium that causes tuberculosis. Scientists hope that finding new drugs to kill the bacteria in ways different than current drugs will help tackle those strains.

Cell envelopes form a virtually impenetrable bubble around the bacterium cell and protect it. Mycolic acids are key portions of this bacterium’s cell envelope. They are made inside the cell, but have to cross the cell membrane – with the help of a transporter -- to reach their final location in the cell envelope.

“Without mycolic acids in the cell envelope, the bacteria die,” said Mary Jackson, one of the leading researchers on the project. Jackson is a professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology. “While randomly testing a group of compounds against the bacterium in the lab, we found one class of compounds that powerfully stops the growth of the bacterium—a significant finding on its own. When we looked closer, we found that the compounds stopped a transporter from moving mycolic acids from inside to outside the cell, which also means this discovery identified a new method of killing the bacterium.

Scientists have been trying to find the transporter of mycolic acids for decades, knowing that understanding how to stop mycolic acids from reaching the surface of the cell could lead to new tuberculosis treatments.

“If mycolic acids cannot be transported, the tuberculosis bacterium cannot grow,” said Mike McNeil, co-researcher on the project with Jackson and also a professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology at CSU. “It is like a factory making bricks and no way to get them to the construction site. It is a long, hard road to develop new, badly-needed tuberculosis drugs. Still, we are optimistic that this research will strongly contribute to the worldwide crusade to diminish suffering and death caused by tuberculosis.”

Jackson, McNeil and partner researchers from CSU and St. Jude Children’s Hospital in Memphis also note that there are other potential transporters in the bacterium that resemble the one just found.

“We hope that our work also will pave the way to understanding what those transporters do in the cell and finding how to target them to kill the mycobacteria,” Jackson said.

Tuberculosis causes the death of more than 1.5 million people around the globe each year.

The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. It was one of 23 projects funded through a special, highly competitive grant process that was part of the stimulus funding strategy.

The money, a round of financing from Northwater Capital’s Intellectual Property Fund, will be used to grow the company and hire new employees, said VanDyne SuperTurbo spokesman Tom Waldron.

“Thanks to Northwater, we are going to be able to take the SuperTurbo from a prototype to a product in the next two years,” company founder Ed VanDyne said in a statement. “This round of funding will allow the company to put the SuperTurbo through the rigorous durability testing required by the automotive industry.”

The SuperTurbo allows for one device to supercharge, turbocharge and turbo-compound the engine, Waldron said, ”a technique where you mechanically transfer the energy in the exhaust flow back into the powertrain.”

The SuperTurbo is expected to provide up to 6 percent efficiency gains in trucks, according to the company.

The $8 million will provide the funding for 500 hours of testing on SuperTurbo engines of different sizes, Waldron said.

“The ultimate goal is for the company to be funded through customers,“ he said. To get to that point, you have to prove your system is durable enough for our customer base.”

Northwater Capital CEO David Patterson called the SuperTurbo “breakthrough” technology that will allow for the size of engines to decrease while improving efficiency.

VanDyne SuperTurbo employs 13 people, but Waldron said he did not know how many more employees the company plans to hire.

The company tests its engines at the Colorado State University Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory and operates a joint research program with CSU, Waldron said.

Steve Lynn • Northern Colorado Business Report - State lawmakers this legislative session have proposed bills to give startups a venture-capital boost. For some, that raises the question of what role our cash-strapped state government should play in the private sector.

It’s a question that gets a lot of attention from the team at CSU Ventures, a group that helps commercialize technologies developed by academics at Colorado State University. Finding funding for startups represents a “key bottleneck” faced by the organization, CSU Ventures Vice President Tim Reeser said.

Reeser argues that government should participate as much as any other group. After all, governments generate revenue from successful businesses and job-creation, not to mention the benefits of new technology.

“You look at the value of research and the impact on human life of a lot of things we’re working on: whether it’s in the life sciences space or energy space, it has a significant greater-good impact,” he said. 

Government help is especially important today as venture capital firms nationwide have halted investments or closed their doors, resulting in fewer dollars for technology startups in Colorado, Reeser said.

While software venture capital investments surged to a 10-year high recently, investments in life-sciences and clean-technology saw sharp decreases, according to a recent report from PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP.

A proposed grant program that supports so-called technology transfer offices like CSU Ventures would help. Under a bill introduced by Rep. Dave Young, D-Greeley, these tech-transfer offices could receive as much as $750,000 in state funding apiece. The measure has passed the House Economic Development and Business Committee.

Another bill known as the Colorado Entrepreneur act would establish a venture capital advisory board to review obstacles facing the state and develop methods to increase access to capital. Sponsored by Sen. Rollie Heath, D-Boulder, the bill has passed the Senate Business, Labor and Technology Committee.

Colorado startups could use assistance from both bills.

Despite their success in the technology sector, Colorado startups particularly struggle for funding because the state lacks a strong history of venture capital financing, CSU Ventures Vice President Terry Opgenorth said. Most venture capital technology and life sciences funds reside on the East and West Coasts in cities where governments have backed startup funding efforts.

“Their perception, at least, has been that there’s not as much deal flow in Colorado,” said Opgenorth, referring to venture capitalists in the San Francisco Bay area and Boston. “We don’t believe that’s true. … There is enough for them to look at.”

Responding to the lack of funding, the organization has considered seeking money from alumni and other donors in addition to maintaining the connections they have made with venture capital firms throughout the country.

Some people might worry that startups could leave Colorado after receiving state funding. But nearly 90 percent of the startups that CSU Ventures have assisted have remained within the state, Headley said.

That could change if companies cannot find Colorado financing. Venture capitalists that fund startups ultimately control their location, Reeser said. “It’s very common for them to wake up and say, ‘We want them in our own backyard,” he said.

CSU Ventures currently operates with $5 million in annual funding from the state Office of Economic Development and International Trade, much of it devoted to startup financing. Additional funding would be well spent, considering the group already leverages other organizations such as the technology incubator Rocky Mountain Innosphere, Colorado Cleantech Industry Association and Colorado BioScience Association to carry out its mission.

“We have a lot of people we engage with on sort of an as-needed basis to help us out,” CSU Ventures President Todd Headley said.

That assistance should include a relatively small contribution from government, or us taxpayers. Successful startup firms certainly will repay us not only in tax revenue, but with technology that will improve our lives.

Rocca received the award along with professors Henry Kapteyn and Margaret Murnane of the University of Colorado-Boulder. Both Kapteyn and Murnane work with Rocca in the multi-institutional National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center for Extreme Ultraviolet Science and Technology based at Colorado State.

This is the second major award for Rocca – one of only 12 University Distinguished Professors at any one time at Colorado State – in recent months. In October, he was awarded the 2011 Arthur L. Schawlow Prize in Laser Science from the American Physical Society, which is one of the highest honors for a physicist.

Rocca is an international leader in the development of compact X-ray lasers. He and his team have found ways to dramatically improve the quality of ultra-short wavelength light produced by small-sized lasers - a groundbreaking discovery particularly valuable for nanoscience and nanotechnology.

Rocca joined Colorado State in 1983 and holds a joint appointment in the departments of electrical and computer engineering and physics. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, the Optical Society of America, and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. He is a past recipient of the National Science Foundation’s Presidential Young Investigator Award and the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineer’s Distinguished Lecturer Award. Rocca earned his bachelor’s in physics from the University of Rosario in Argentina and his doctoral degree in electrical engineering from Colorado State.

The NSF Extreme Ultraviolet Engineering Research Center, a partnership between Colorado State in Fort Collins, the University of Colorado-Boulder and the University of California-Berkeley, combines the expertise of researchers who are among the world leaders in developing compact extreme ultraviolet coherent light sources, optics and optical systems for nanoscience, nanotechnology and other applications.

For more information about the Willis E. Lamb Award, go to http://www.lambaward.org/2012/index.html.

FORT COLLINS - Colorado State University, its spinoff Envirofit International and Oak Ridge National Laboratory have been honored by the Federal Laboratory Consortium for designing and disseminating a cleaner burning cookstove that is directly helping households throughout the developing world.

The Award for Excellence in Technology Transfer recognizes employees of FLC member laboratories and non-laboratory staff who have accomplished outstanding work in the process of transferring federally developed technology.

Bryan Willson, founder of the Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory and a mechanical engineering professor, started the cookstoves program at the university and is a co-founder of Envirofit.

His co-director, Morgan DeFoort, leads a team of undergraduate and graduate students who worked with Oak Ridge and Envirofit to develop a proprietary alloy for the cookstove’s combustion chamber as well as an orifice plate that helps the stoves reduce smoke and toxic emissions by up to 80 percent. The ring creates turbulence that directs unburned gases into the center of the combustion chamber.

“This award recognizes the collaboration that we welcome at Colorado State that provides our students exposure to some of the top engineers in their fields and also produces hands-on solutions applicable in the real world,” DeFoort said.

The award for “Materials for a Low-Cost, Clean Cookstove” is shared by Colorado State, Envirofit and Oak Ridge Envirofit researchers for developing the EnviroFlame Combustion System, which is the heart of Envirofit cookstoves.

The trick for the students is continuing to improve the efficiency and durability of the stove while keeping costs low, DeFoort said. Envirofit now has numerous products that incorporate the alloy and has sold over 300,000 stoves across India, Africa, Southeast Asia and Latin America.

Envirofit is a private, non-profit technology leader using sustainable, scalable business models to solve global health and environmental problems. The four founding partners of Envirofit all have ties to CSU: Willson, co-director of the laboratory; Paul Hudnut, instructor in the College of Business; and two former students of Willson’s, Tim Bauer and Nathan Lorenz, now vice president of Operations and vice president of Engineering, respectively, for Envirofit.

“We are honored to receive this award. It is has been incredible to have access to the cutting edge research and knowledge base at Oak Ridge National Lab to help address people\'s fundamental need to cook on cleaner more efficient biomass stoves,” Lorenz said.

FORT COLLINS - A Colorado State University chemistry professor has developed several patent-pending chemical processes that would create sustainable bioplastics from renewable resources for use on everything from optical fibers and contact lenses to furniture and automobile parts.

Chemistry Professor Eugene Chen and his co-workers have invented a platform of processes to convert small molecules derived from nonedible plant biomass to bioplastics. The molecules can be transformed into different materials depending on the catalyst that is added to them. That catalyst can either be an organic compound or a metal-based compound.

Officials with CSU Ventures, the university’s technology transfer arm, are optimistic about the commercial potential of this work and have filed several provisional patent applications on Chen’s processes. Two related studies were published last year and this month, both in Angewandte Chemie International Edition.

“Each year, the U.S. alone manufactures almost 90 billion pounds of synthetic plastics derived predominantly from fossil fuels, which are not renewable,” Chen said. “There’s a great deal of concern to develop sustainable polymers or materials that can displace those petrochemical polymers. There’s huge interest in academia and industry, so the largest companies such as Dow Chemical, Dupont and BASF are pursuing sustainable chemical feedstocks to make materials.”

The organic process Chen created could be used to produce commodity plastics for everyday uses such as artificial glass, dental resins, automobile parts and furniture. His metal-based process would be used to produce high-performance engineering plastic materials that have superb mechanical and physical properties.

Chen has found in his laboratory that commercially available organic catalysts applied to small molecules derived from plant biomass are very active and efficient – the reaction achieves completion within a minute – and non-toxic. He also has developed a metal-based catalyst system that produces “stereoregular” polymers that exhibit superior physical and mechanical properties, meaning they’re very robust and more resistant to such factors as temperature, liquids, chemicals and scratches.

Plastic optical fibers, for example, must sustain exposure to the elements and still perform at a high level so they don’t interrupt telecommunications service.

“These materials require high resistance to extreme conditions including high temperature and unexpected environmental invasion,” Chen said.

Chen has done previous research showing that dissolving plant biomass in “green” solvent ionic liquids - salts that melt at low temperatures - converts more sugars needed for biofuel more quickly than traditional methods. The discovery was an important step in the move toward the use of nonedible plant biomass as an alternative source for fuel. Most recently, Chen’s lab has filed a provisional patent for a new catalytic process in ionic liquids to convert plant biomass to platform chemicals.

Chen joined Colorado State in 2000 from Dow Chemical where he researched production of petroleum-based polyolefin plastics. His current research has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy.

Yuetao Zhang, a research scientist; Yangjian Hu, a postdoctoral fellow; and Garret Miyake, a graduate student, all work with Chen and contribute to the research.

FORT COLLINS - Mario Marconi, professor in Colorado State University’s Electrical and Computer Engineering department in the College of Engineering, has been recognized as an Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Fellow – his second major honor this year.

Marconi was the only CSU scientist acknowledged in this year’s class of Fellows. He was recognized for his contributions to development and use of compact soft x-ray lasers.

In January 2011, Marconi was named a Fellow with the Optical Society of America for contributions to the advancement of optics. Marconi was recognized for “significant contributions to the development of compact soft x-ray lasers and for pioneering their use in table top coherent lithography, holography and interferometry.” .

Marconi, who joined Colorado State in 2004, is a member of the NSF Engineering Research Center for Extreme Ultraviolet Science and Technology - a multi-institutional center based at CSU - where his research is focused in nanopatterning and high-resolution imaging.

IEEE is the world’s largest professional association dedicated to advancing technological innovation and excellence for the benefit of humanity. IEEE and its members inspire a global community through IEEE's highly cited publications, conferences, technology standards and professional and educational activities.

Marconi is currently exploring new possible applications of extreme ultraviolet lasers for nanofabrication and to obtain images of objects with nanometer resolution, similar to the resolution that can be achieved using electron microscopes. Since joining Colorado State, Marconi has been involved with $5 million in research contracts awarded to the university.

About IEEE

The IEEE website states that the grade of Fellow first appeared in the AIEE constitution of 1912. That year, the AIEE revised its membership structure and established the grade of Fellow for those engineers who had demonstrated outstanding proficiency and had achieved distinction in their profession. Today, the IEEE grade of Fellow is conferred by the Board of Directors upon a person with an extraordinary record of accomplishments in any of the IEEE fields of interest. More info...

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We are grateful that the state of Colorado, as well as Colorado State University, place strong emphasis on innovation, entrepreneurship and technology development. These certainly are factors that fuel much of our work at CSU Ventures and help drive our economy.

As we move into the holiday season, I wanted to share some of the new and interesting medical innovations recently discovered at Colorado State University.

Better, Faster Diagnoses

Cytology, or the study of cells in a patient sample, is a useful diagnostic tool, often aiding in the diagnosis of cancer, as well as a number of infectious diseases. In cytology-based testing, a patient’s biopsy sample is placed on slides, after which, chemical staining and subsequent analysis is performed to make a diagnosis.

Researchers at CSU have developed a microfluidic cytology system — a chip which, when placed over a sample slide, enables multiple stains to be performed on the slide simultaneously, on a micro-scale.

The system is being developed in the lab of Professor Charles Henry, a researcher in the chemistry department. His research focuses on the fields of chemical separations and lab-on-a-chip devices; specifically, the development of microfluidic devices for rapid diagnostics and point-of-measurement analyses.

Personalized Medicine

Professor Kevin Lear in CSU’s College of Engineering, has developed an extremely small, optical biosensor technology that allows for the simultaneous analysis of thousands of biological pairs (DNA, antibodies, proteins, etc.) on a small microchip platform.

The biosensor could enable doctors to rapidly screen a person’s genome for particular indicators of disease or drug susceptibility. It also would allow researchers to look for correlations between genes and diseases in mice or other laboratory animals.

Featured on the cover of Lab-on-a-Chip Magazine (a prominent, peer-reviewed journal), this technology has the potential to realize personalized medicine in a convenient, electronic readout. This device could replace the current fluorescent microarrays currently used to survey large numbers of genes.

Surgical and Chemotherapy Solutions

Surgeries and surgical implants increase the risk for infection and post-surgical complications. CSU researchers (David Prawel, Sue James and Ketul Popat) have now discovered a highly efficient, low-cost technology to help ward off infection, enhance integration of implants into bones and offer targeted chemotherapy treatment.

Their technology involves applying multiple thin layers of lipids, which contain drugs, onto medical implants and devices. These thin layers are applied using a process known as electro-spraying.

Using these multiple layers, drugs such as antibiotics or chemotherapeutics can be applied to medical implants and then the layers come off in the body over time. E-spraying creates a three-dimensional coating and is a highly efficient method for creating multi-layer drug coatings on many types of implants.

This creates a long-lasting effect of the drug inside the body. Currently, research has shown that mice infected with bacteria can clear the infection when a coated implant is placed in the mouse within 30 days without any other antibiotic intervention.

All of these innovations certainly have the potential to revolutionize modern medicine. We are proud of the work taking place in the labs at CSU and look forward to sharing more exciting developments in the New Year. Happy Holidays.

Kevin Duggan • Coloradoan – An iconic city-owned building on North College Avenue and the surrounding property are in line to undergo some dramatic changes.

The CSU Engines & Energy Conversion Laboratory, which has been housed in the former city power plant building since 1994, has proposed adding a 60,000-square-foot building to the site. The triangle-shaped property is wedged between College Avenue, the Poudre River and an active railroad line.

As part of the project, utility buildings east of the main building as well as trailers that house Solix Biofuels, a spinoff company from the lab that is developing biodiesel from algae, would be removed and replaced with green space.

A fence separating lab equipment from the Poudre River Trail would be moved along with some of the equipment.

The final product would be visually dramatic but not massive, said Bryan Willson, founder and director of the engines lab, in an interview.

The facility, which would be called the Energy Innovation Center, is likely to attract international researchers and business people, he said.

It would be linked to operations such as New Belgium Brewing Co. and the Rocky Mountain Innosphere, a nearby high-tech business incubator, and the new Fort Collins Museum of Discovery.

"This will further build Fort Collins' reputation for innovation," he said. "It brings a focus downtown and creates primary jobs."

Lease Changes
Willson and the Colorado State University Research Foundation, or CSURF, have been discussing amendments to the lab's lease with city officials for five years. The City Council is expected to give preliminary consideration to a revised lease agreement at its Oct. 18 meeting.

The new lease would allow the lab to use the property for 40 years with the possibility of two 20-year extensions. CSURF would pay $25 a year to lease the land the first 40 years and $50 a year for the next 20 years, under a proposal reviewed last week by City Council.

The length of the lease is needed to secure funding for the $16 million project, which will be funded through donations, officials said.

Council members did not vote on the proposal, but most said they favor revising the lease and supporting the lab even with the lease potentially lasting 80 years.

"I think this project ... is kind of everything we're about," said Mayor pro-tem Kelly Ohlson. "... It's CSU, CSURF, city partnerships; it's environmental health, economic health, good planning, infill redevelopment, habitat restoration. I mean, if not this, what?"

The revised lease would allow CSURF to build a parking lot for the facility on space next to the Northside Aztlan Community Center that could be used by Aztlan patrons on off hours.

The lease arrangement would be a benefit to the city, City Manager Darin Atteberry told the council. Marketing the property for other uses would be difficult.

CSURF and the lab have been "respectful" of the site's history and environmental issues over the years and in crafting their proposal, Atteberry said.

"I think that CSU and CSURF are uniquely situated right now to be able do this primarily through donations and through a different investor than someone who might invest in a student housing project or commercial project in the downtown area," he said.

Connect Past, Future
Current plans for the new building call for it to be connected to and complement the existing familiar red-brick structure. When the building was a coal-fired power plant, it had four smokestacks that were removed years ago.

The 30-foot stacks would return, but this time they would be wind turbines. A hopper for wood chips and biomass would go in where a coal hopper once stood.

The new building would be designed to blend in with the historic building. A fountain that has stood in front of the building about 40 years would be moved a few yards to make way for the new structure, said.

"The fountain would become an architectural element of the building rather than an afterthought," Willson said.

Lab officials are still working with city planners and the Landmark Preservation Commission on designs for the building. If the proposal gets through the city's development review process, construction could begin in May.

A portion of the site, which the city acquired in 1912, was a municipal landfill for many years. Soil compaction on the property is not adequate to accommodate the original design, which was for a three-story building with a basement, Willson said.

The current design is for a four-story building that would include space for classrooms, laboratories, offices, and advanced-energy businesses.

The power plant operated from 1935 to 1972. After it was decommissioned, the building sat vacant for years and fell into disrepair.

Willson started looking at the building as a potential lab in 1992. It was unheated and had no plumbing or insulation. Of its 4,000 windows, half were broken or missing.

About $10 million has been invested in the building over the years to make the facility what it is today. But the interior is cramped and more lab space is needed, he said.

The new building will be state-of-the-art in terms of energy efficiency, Willson said. It would be designed to meet platinum LEED certification standards at a minimum and be one of the most advanced buildings in the world.

The property has soil and groundwater contamination stemming from its days as a landfill and industrial site, including benzene, arsenic, lead, ploy-aromatic hydrocarbons and methane.

CSURF would be responsible for managing contamination as it goes through construction following guidelines set by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, said Carol Webb, regulatory and governmental affairs manager for the city.

"This isn't technically a cleanup, it's really about managing the materials in place," she said.

Betty Beard • Arizona Business & Money –The 14 early-stage companies were picked from a record number of about 130 applicants to appear at the Invest Southwest Capital Conference.

The meeting this year is being merged with a similar conference under the auspices of the Erie, Colo.-based Venture Capital in the Rockies, organizers said.

Their joint conference will be Nov. 2-4 at the J.W. Marriott Desert Ridge Resort in Phoenix.

The combined event not only drew a record number of applicants but is also expected to attract more investors than Invest Southwest generally has drawn on its own, said Karen Katzorke, executive director of Invest Southwest Capital Conference.

"We typically see 125 investors, and we hope by partnering with Venture Capital in the Rockies this year we will see an additional 50 investors," she said. Most of them are from the Southwest, but others are expected to come from around the world.

The 130 applicants surpassed the usual 75 to 100 who apply, she said.

Each one typically asks for $1 million to $10 million

Each company gets about 10 minutes to pitch its products or services to investors. Investors then take up to a year to decide which companies they will invest in and how much funding will be offered, Katzorke said.

Since Invest Southwest started in 1992, its applicants have received almost $250 million, she said.

The Arizona presenters will be

• Green Light Cost Management, a Scottsdale information-technology firm offering services to help health-care companies manage their expenses.
• MSDx, Inc., a Tucson company that develops commercial products to monitor neurological and autoimmune disorders, including multiple sclerosis.
• Post.Bid.Ship, also of Tucson, was founded by three University of Arizona students to use technology to streamline freight transportation.
• SyCara, of Scottsdale, provides search-engine-optimization technology to help companies manage workflow and reports.

Another company, San Diego-based Medipacs, has a research lab in Tucson. It has created a solid-state polymer pump that offers a new way to deliver medicine.

• 2c Tech Corp., Irvine, Calif., has developed a nanotechnology-based injectable medical device to prevent blindness.
• Azano Pharmaceuticals, Albuquerque, produces a protein to help treat kidney failure associated with lupus and other autoimmune inflammatory pathogens.
• Exagen Diagnostics, also of Albuquerque, develops diagnostic and drug-monitoring tests for diseases and therapeutics.
• Goomzee, Missoula, Mont., provides real-estate information over mobile devices.
• Prieto Battery, Fort Collins, Colo., offers a new style of lightweight lithium-ion battery invented by researchers at Colorado State University.
• Rockit Media, Boulder, Colo., has created an automated method to simplify marketing processes for social media and mobile devices and track customer engagement.
• Swarmology, La Jolla, Calif., develops real-time marketing tools for social media.
• Transactiv, Boulder, Colo., created a variety of on-demand services to help companies communicate and collaborate across a variety of channels.
• Wasatch Microfluidics, Salt Lake City, provides instruments for drug research.

FORT COLLINS - Colorado State University today lent its support to a White House initiative to promote and encourage the role of major research universities as drivers of economic development.

Colorado State is one of more than 100 universities that have supported a push by the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and the Association of American Universities for more visibility for the role of universities in economic development efforts.

President Barack Obama also today signed the patent reform bill, which will provide resources to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and clarify the patent application process. CSU and many U.S. universities have largely supported the bill because it will help them stay more competitive and reduce costs primarily due to litigation.

As Colorado’s only land-grant institution, Colorado State faculty and students create new companies and jobs critical to Colorado’s economy, prepare students for the workforce and enable innovation. The university has influenced state and national economic development activities and enacted major initiatives to improve partnerships in the community and encourage entrepreneurship.

“Partnerships between Colorado State and the economic development community are critical to a strong economy," said Bill Farland, vice president for Research at Colorado State and formerly a top federal scientist. "We can provide the technology that will help position the state as a leader in innovation and develop partnerships to ensure a healthy job base.”

The university works in tandem with state and local economic development leaders, such as the Fort Collins Area Chamber of Commerce, to promote job creation and facilitate partnerships that lead to economic health of the community.

“CSU, in combination with the high technology sector of the economy, drives innovation,” said David May, president and CEO of the Fort Collins Area Chamber of Commerce. “A synergy is created that is hard to describe but very real. Our community generates 11.45 patents per 10,000 population, four times the national average. The expeditious issuance of patents and the protection of intellectual property are extremely important to the local economy.”

Colorado State is having a national impact on innovation and economic development efforts. This summer, Ron Sega, vice president for Energy and the Environment at Colorado State, joined other business and economic development leaders to prepare a report on Colorado innovation and job creation. The Colorado Competes Report was submitted to President Obama last week.

Earlier in the spring, Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper selected Colorado State University to help with his “Bottom-Up” economic development initiative because of the university’s deep connection to communities statewide through Extension offices. Facilitating that statewide effort on behalf of the university was Kathay Rennels, CSU director of Economic Development and former County Commissioner. Rennels routinely works with state economic development agencies, county commissioners and mayors, businesses, and regional groups to advance collaborative and productive networks across the state to create economic development opportunities.

The university is further positioned to influence innovation and economic policies by serving as the home for the regional economist for northern Colorado, Professor Martin Shields, who is a member of the economics faculty at Colorado State and for former Gov. Bill Ritter, who serves as director of the university’s Center for the New Energy Economy.

Highlights of other Colorado State economic development activities:

Superclusters: Entrepreneurial faculty work together in areas of research strength to increase collaboration among disciplines to develop marketable solutions to the current challenges in the areas of cancer, clean energy and infectious disease. Within several years of creating the Superclusters, faculty invention disclosures in some of these areas as much as tripled. http://www.supercluster.colostate.edu/

CSU Ventures: A private, non-profit advocacy arm of the university that handles technology transfer activities and supports the Superclusters with technical business and industry expertise to commercialize university inventions. As part of this effort, the university has created a Startup Guide – an overview meant to assist inventors who would like to found a company based on technology that they have created during the course of their CSU activities. .http://www.csurf.org/tto/

CAMT Northern Colorado Manufacturing Extension Partnership: The Colorado Association for Manufacturing and Technology (CAMT) and the CSU Office of Community and Economic Development are partners in the CAMT Northern Colorado Manufacturing Extension Partnership Regional Office at CSU. This partnership fits into the efforts of the Colorado Regional Innovation Cluster for Aerospace and Clean Energy, which is a strategic statewide approach to promote innovation in related Colorado industries by connecting them with partners, leveraging federal funds, and attracting private capital investment in the Colorado region. http://outreach.colostate.edu/econ-dev/camt.html

Industry Partnership Committee: The Industry Partnership Committee is made up of representatives from across the university working to improve and encourage the university’s relationship with industry. The committee aims to assist businesses to more easily connect with the extensive intellectual assets of the university.

Federal Demonstration Partnership: Colorado State participates in the Federal Demonstration Partnership convened by the National Academy of Science's Government-University-Industry-Research Roundtable. The FDP is a cooperative initiative among 10 Federal agencies and 98 institutional recipients of federal funds; its purpose is to reduce the administrative burdens for faculty and staff engaged in research and to enhance research effectiveness. http://sites.nationalacademies.org/PGA/fdp/index.htm

University Industry Demonstration Partnership: The University Industry Demonstration Partnership consists of universities and companies seeking a stronger relationship. The organization provides a forum for discussion of contracting and intellectual property policy, publication and technology transfer preferences, and other issues. http://sites.nationalacademies.org/PGA/uidp/PGA_049074

Carol Potera • Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News – Companies spend billions of dollars annually on the development of human drugs, devices, and diagnostics. Yet many promising products fail to reach the marketplace and their value is never realized. VetDC was started in Fort Collins, CO, last year to repurpose discarded and shelved technologies for veterinary use. The company in-licenses emerging, underexploited technologies from human biotechnology companies, then develops and commercializes them for dogs, cats, and other companion animals.

VetDC’s primary focus is cancer, and its first acquisition in March this year was GS-9219, a molecule discovered by scientists at Gilead Sciences. VetDC holds an exclusive North American license to GS-9219 for veterinary use. Now known as VDC-1101, the antiproliferative agent preferentially targets and kills lymphoid cells.

VDC-1101 is a prodrug of the nucleotide analog PMEG that selectively accumulates in malignant lymphoid cells where it converts to an active form that inhibits DNA synthesis and induces apoptosis. In 38 dogs with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, 79% showed tumor regression, as reported in the May 15, 2009, issue of Clinical Cancer Research. To date, about 70 client-owned dogs with cancer have been treated with VDC-1101.

Cancer is a leading cause of death in dogs, and lymphoma is one of the most common canine and feline cancers. Dogs with lymphoma are typically treated with human chemotherapy drugs, but typically more than 90% will relapse within 5 to 10 months. Better alternatives are needed.

“There are no approved drugs for canine lymphoma today, and VDC-1101 has the opportunity to be the first FDA-approved product specifically for canine lymphoma,” says Steven Roy, president and CEO at VetDC. The company plans to test VDC-1101 in cats, too.

Devices and Diagnostics
VetDC is also testing a surgical implant to treat glaucoma in dogs and cats. The novel drainage device is implanted into the outer layer of the eye to relieve pressure that causes pain, discomfort, and blindness. Aqueous Biomedical developed the implant device based on a patented biomaterial.

A third product in VetDC’s pipeline is a point-of-care detection kit for drug-resistant strains of bacteria that plague human hospitals. Drug-resistant bacterial infections are increasingly common in pets and veterinary clinics, too. The technology came from MicroPhage and uses bacteriophage amplification to identify drug-resistant strains of Staphylococcus aureus.

University Affiliation
When Gilead Sciences was testing GS-9219 as a possible therapy for human cancer, it turned to the Veterinary Teaching Hospital at Colorado State University (CSU) to perform the preclinical animal trials.

“We were quite familiar with Gilead’s early work because of a strong existing research relationship. We were able to acquire a license to this product specifically for veterinary cancer,” says Roy. Leveraging the safety, tolerability, efficacy, and dosing data from the early preclinical studies “gives us a big head start to move quickly to market and dramatically improves our probability of success.” This information will guide the design of additional studies to gain approval for the drug to treat canine lymphoma.

VetDC’s association with CSU provides firsthand contact with many biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies that conduct animal studies there. Familiarity with these projects is likely to uncover more emerging technologies with potential for adaptation or modification to veterinary markets. By working with CSU researchers, VetDC also avoids the costs of building its own laboratories and hiring researchers.

Unexplored Opportunities
All new drugs intended to treat human diseases must first be tested in animal models, providing a rich source of data for veterinary applications. However, few biotechnology companies consider targeting veterinary diseases, even though animals and humans often experience similar diseases and respond to similar treatments. “Opportunities to improve the quality of life for companion animals with serious illnesses are too important to go unexplored,” says Roy.

The Center for Veterinary Medicine at the U.S. FDA regulates the development of drugs for pets. “People think it’s faster to gain approval for animal drugs, but that’s not necessarily the case,” explains Roy. The testing of pet drugs often can be as rigorous as for human drugs. “It is critically important that new technologies for veterinary use are evaluated in clinical veterinary settings and optimized for the unique demands of veterinary clinicians, patients, and their owners.”

There are 75 million pet dogs and 82 million pet cats in the United States, and Americans spend $13 billion on veterinary care yearly. Recent surveys show that more than one-half of pet owners consider pets to be members of the family and are willing to spend significant amounts on their healthcare. Even during economic downturns, spending on pet healthcare holds steady. “More and more people are willing to pay for high-quality care for their pets,” says Roy.

Hotels offered rooms, and a local brewery tour was the cherry on top.

The company leaders asked about everything from airline prices to Chicago and cultural offerings, down to the temperature difference between Colorado Springs, Reno and Fort Collins.

The understanding was that we must be much colder than the Springs because we're farther north.

In the end, the company decided to relocate to Northern Colorado because of the quality of life, culture, talented workforce, clean energy DNA, CSU research and the obvious one - we are 2 degrees warmer than the Springs on average.

In another example, a recent conversation with a visiting $26 billion global firm's senior vice president reflects some of the challenges we face while working with a relocating business. I asked him what the likelihood of a relocation of one of their manufacturing plants to Northern Colorado would be.

He explained that eight years ago they had to decide between outsourcing overseas or automating their current plants.

They chose to stay in the U.S. and to automate in order to save money. Due to new automation, their plants are down 500 employees each. This leaves their facilities with underutilized space. In addition, he explained that their supply chains are deeply rooted within each state. The likelihood of relocation was slim because of the above factors.

In a typical year, recession or not, the Northern Colorado Economic Development Corporation, or NCEDC, will court up to 90 companies looking to relocate or expand.

At the same time, we service the expansion and economic development needs of an additional 180 existing firms. NCEDC is only one of almost 40,000 agencies and communities vying for between 400 and 1,000 company relocations nationally each year.

An expanding company typically hires a site selection consultant to narrow down the many hungry communities into a short list of favorites.

Ninety-nine percent of the time, our agency does not know who the company is until they are down to their final location choices.

We provide data on real estate, incentives, workforce, utilities, tornado likelihood reports and many other specific requests.

When the site selector decides that Northern Colorado is a match for the growing firm, our region is known for its rapid response.

This region will continue to be proactive in the attraction of new businesses to the area. Our best shot at building a larger primary firm base in Northern Colorado is to work with our existing firms and bet on innovation for job creation.

In a time when new jobs are on the minds and tongues of everyone from President Barack Obama to that neighbor who cannot make her house payment for the sixth straight month, our work is vital.

We provide data on real estate, incentives, workforce, utilities, tornado likelihood reports and many other specific requests.

The cache represents more than 30,000 experimental varieties that Haley and his team have developed and will plant in 14 Colorado test plots in September in their ongoing hunt for wheat that thrives in the state’s harsh growing conditions.

“Plant breeding has been likened to a numbers game because genetics is all about probability,” said Haley, who leads the renowned CSU Wheat Breeding and Genetics Program. “From crosses with just a few varieties, you can develop millions of possible trait outcomes, and that’s what we do. We’re looking for the needle in the haystack that will perform well and become the new variety we release to farmers.”

Haley and his team released two such varieties of hard red winter wheat in August, following more than eight years of development and analysis. Research data suggest the varieties – called “Byrd” and “Brawl CL Plus” – have the capacity to produce higher yields and excellent baking flour, even in the face of Colorado farming challenges, including drought, changing climactic conditions, and newly emergent insects and disease.

The CSU Wheat Breeding and Genetics Program is considered exemplary in research and farming circles for its fruitful 50-year partnership with Colorado wheat organizations – a partnership that has provided critical funding for university research while producing varieties that have helped to significantly boost wheat as a state commodity.

In 2010-11 alone, the Colorado Wheat Administrative Committee and Colorado Wheat Research Foundation provided nearly $800,000 to support CSU wheat breeding and wheat-related research. The Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station provided about $1.6 million in state, federal and grant funds. In addition, CSU Extension supports the wheat program with specialists on campus and in statewide offices.

The result is clear: Colorado farmers plant nearly 2.5 million acres of winter wheat each year, and more than 65 percent of this acreage is planted in varieties developed at CSU, according to the Colorado Agricultural Statistics Service. In 2011, Colorado ranked fourth in the nation in winter wheat production, behind Kansas, Washington and Montana, the Colorado Wheat Administrative Committee reported.

Indeed, wheat growers and officials dubbed wheat harvested in 2011 a “miracle crop,” due in large part to CSU wheat varieties that overcame a parched fall, winter and early spring.

“With the drought tolerance that CSU has bred into these varieties, they were able to hold on, and when we did get moisture this spring, it was amazing to see the yields around the state,” said Tom Neira, a Bennett wheat farmer and president of the Colorado Wheat Administrative Committee.

That’s significant given the vital role of dryland wheat farming in rural communities stretching up and down Colorado’s Eastern Plains, and demand for wheat among both domestic and export markets.

“We have a phenomenal wheat-research program with CSU, and it’s getting stronger,” said Darrell Hanavan, executive director of the three organizations that make up Colorado Wheat. “There is a dynamic relationship between Colorado wheat producers and our land-grant university.”

Haley is almost giddy when he considers the potential for CSU’s two newest varieties. The Colorado Wheat Research Foundation now holds the ownership and marketing rights for Byrd and Brawl CL Plus, according to an agreement that also involves the CSU Research Foundation and the Colorado Seed Growers Association.

In field trials, Byrd has produced 10 percent higher yields than CSU’s popular Hatcher variety, which accounts for 35 percent of Colorado’s total wheat acreage because of its own high, stable yields.

“This is a blockbuster,” Hanavan said of Byrd. “It’s got a 10-percent yield advantage over the No. 1 variety in Colorado. That’s really significant.”

The variety is named for Byrd Curtis, who was CSU’s first wheat breeder and led the university program for five years beginning in 1963, before moving on to a distinguished international career.

“I am just overwhelmed. It is a great honor,” Curtis, of Fort Collins, recently said of the tribute. “I am amazed at the attributes of the variety, and I look forward to learning more about it. I hope it does well for farmers.”

Many wheat varieties grown in Colorado may be traced to those Curtis developed decades ago, Haley noted.

“In naming this variety for Byrd, I wanted to make a historical connection and highlight the importance of long-term funding for public wheat breeding. The CSU wheat-breeding program that Dr. Curtis started is going on its 50th year of continuing activity and productivity,” Haley said.

Brawl CL Plus, meantime, is notable for its tolerance to Beyond herbicide used to combat winter annual grassy weeds in wheat fields, particularly feral rye. “Brawl” alludes to a battle with rye, Haley said.

Among such tolerant varieties, known as Clearfield wheat, Brawl CL Plus is the first publicly developed winter wheat variety that carries a second gene for tolerance to the herbicide. The new varieties are not genetically modified.

For his part, Haley is now thinking about the next wheat variety that will make waves.

“Our biggest challenge is developing varieties that will endure the environmental stresses of growing in Colorado, and those stresses are constantly in flux,” said Haley, a professor in CSU’s Department of Soil and Crop Sciences. “We’re also on a quest for higher-yielding varieties because we’ll have a global population of 9 billion people by 2050 and we need to produce more food. So we have to keep working.”