Six exciting university projects have been selected to receive funding from Adelaide Research & Innovation (ARI) to help accelerate their research towards commercialisation and community impact.
According to ARI Deputy Director Dr Jane Rathjen, these projects will share in $250,000 allocated through the Commercial Accelerator Scheme (CAS), to provide a cash injection for University of Adelaide researchers to make their project “investment ready”.
“CAS is intended and designed to accelerate the research to the point where it can be picked up by a partner or licensee or attract other commercial investment funds,” she said.
“During the last five years the scheme has contributed over $2.6m to promising early stage technologies and it has provided a bridge for many projects to be licensed or achieve other funding options.”
The successful projects that will receive funding are:
- Developing rhythm map software to help improve the treatment of cardiac arrhythmia – led by Professor Prash Sanders and Darius Chapman
- Optimising the conditions for commercial deflasking and acclimatisation of tissue culture-derived ornamental eucalypt trees – led by Dr Kate Delaporte
- Using peroxidase enzymes to accelerate fracture repair in healthy or osteoporotic bones – led by Professor Andreas Evdokiou
- Validating algorithms that predict risk for pregnancy complications – led by Professor Claire Roberts
- Validating an ELISA diagnostic for early stage gastric cancer – led by Professor Peter Hoffmann
- Evaluating the use of Annexin A2 as a novel diagnostic marker for serous ovarian cancer – led by Dr Carmela Ricciardelli and Professor Martin Oehler
“These projects have the potential to result in significant economic and social benefits – both locally and internationally. In particular, there are some exciting new medical diagnostics that could help to save many lives and deliver significantly improved patient care if they can move from research into products and practice,” said Jane.
“They are a brilliant reflection of the quality research and innovation that is coming out of The University of Adelaide.”
Commercial Accelerator Scheme funding is available to staff members of The University of Adelaide.
News on the 2015 round will be released later in the year. In the meantime interested researchers should contact their ARI Commercial Development Manager (CDM) to discuss the commercial potential of their research and other funding opportunities.