DETROIT - Wayne State University's Innovation Fellows Program is cultivating the next generation of chief scientific officers and entrepreneurial scientists for local high-tech industry. The program is supported by the New Economy Initiative (NEI) for Southeast Michigan and is led by Bramdon Dogwill, project manager of innovation programs in WSU's Technology Commercialization Office.

The first class of fellows recently completed the program by presenting a technology commercialization roadmap of their project. Participants and their projects included:

• Tara Eaton, Ph.D., Promoting Excellence in Resources for Cancer Survivors (PERCS). PERCS will provide a simple, customizable patient portal tool for digital health services for cancer survivors that will aid in their transition from active treatment to survivorship plans for follow-up care. Additional research funding for this program was recently received by Hayley Thompson, Ph.D., associate professor of oncology in Wayne State's School of Medicine, from the Agency for Healthcare Quality to continue enhancements to the system and bring it into homes to test its effectiveness.
• Luke Reisner, Ph.D., Robotic Enhanced Systems. Robotic Enhanced Systems aims to replace the current method of camera movement during robotic surgery to reduce surgeon workload and stress. With this enhanced surgical system, surgeons will have greater control of the surgical camera and computer that may reduce communication problems and robotic surgical errors and decrease time spent in each surgical procedure.
• Jennell White, Ph.D., Functional Fluidics. Functional Fluidics has created microfluidic devices that will help drug companies more thoroughly evaluate drugs designed to treat conditions such as sickle cell anemia for unwanted side effects that cause blood clots. 
• Venkat Nadithe, Ph.D., Drug Delivery Technologies. This early-stage research has the potential as a future startup focused on developing the formulation and drug-delivery-based solutions of nanoparticle-based synthetic antimicrobial compounds. 
• Wesley Colangelo, Ph.D., AMPep Solutions. AMPep Solutions aims to develop antimicrobial peptides as the next class of antibiotic products and therapies to address growing concerns of antibiotic resistant bacteria and infections.  The researchers aim to apply for a Phase 1 SBIR grant opportunity this winter. 
• Rajeshwari Valiathan, Ph.D., Targeted Therapeutics for Triple Negative Breast Cancer. This research aims to find new therapies and improve survival outcomes for patients with triple negative breast cancer by identifying and targeting the expression of specific proteins uniquely expressed in TNBC.

Left to Right: Rajeshwari Valiathan, Tara Eaton, Jennell White, Bramdon Dogwill, Luke Reisner, & Venkat Nadithe

"This program aims to train the next generation of entrepreneurial scientists, and helps them understand what is needed to take a university technology outside of the laboratory and create a new company or license agreement," said Joan Dunbar, associate vice president for technology commercialization at Wayne State University. 

"Our inaugural class of fellows worked with Wayne State University faculty and venture industry mentors to learn how to advance technology from the laboratory bench to the marketplace," said Dogwill. "Each fellow investigated the technological and commercial potential of the research and developed a commercialization plan for their assigned innovations. It is a great opportunity for the fellows who are interested in being a part of the next generation of chief science officers, and also for the faculty mentors as they explore the commercial potential of their research."

The Innovation Fellows Program promotes technology commercialization education for post-docs in the areas of medicine, pharmacy and allied health, nursing, engineering, and liberal arts and sciences. Four to six qualified postdoctoral fellows are recruited to the program annually. In addition to their scientific research, the fellows will be trained in technology and market assessment, product development, business and entrepreneurship. Fellows participate in translational research projects and develop a research and commercialization plan on a project topic. Each fellow is assigned an industry mentor to assist in the development of their project and technology commercialization roadmap.

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Wayne State University is one of the nation's pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit http://www.research.wayne.edu.