13 UB Inventors to Be Honored At Reception As Tech-Transfer Office Adopts New Mission

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Thirteen University at Buffalo inventors will be honored at a reception to be held at 4 p.m. March 15 in the Center for Tomorrow on the UB North (Amherst) Campus.

The reception is the first to be held by the Office of Technology Transfer and Licensing in its new role as part of the UB Business Alliance.

The patents are part of an extensive portfolio, covering 11 categories featuring more than 120 patents, now available for licensing through the Office of Technology Transfer and Licensing.

"Patents are an integral and important part of technology transfer," said Jerry McGuire, the new director of the Office of Technology Transfer and Licensing. However, he noted that the office now will be taking a much broader approach to tech transfer.

"You need to have the technology and the patents in order to do business, but we also have to be able to capitalize on them once you have them," he said.

"If it's patentable, great; if it's a UB technology that's not patentable but it could lead to a new product on the market or could lead to an entrepreneur establishing a company in Western New York that could create new jobs, that's great, too," said McGuire.

"UB is Western New York's ace in the hole" in terms of new technologies, he added.

Inventors who are named on 13 U.S. patents issued to The Research Foundation of State University of New York in 1998 will receive awards recognizing their achievements as inventors of patented devices, materials or drugs.

As is the case each year, some of the inventors are being honored for patents involving improvements and modifications on inventions for which they previously received patents.

-- Timothy Murphy, M.D., of East Amherst, professor of medicine and microbiology, who was granted two patents for compositions and nucleotide sequences for Branhamella catarrhalis as well as recombinant vectors containing these sequences. Applications include constructing recombinant bacterial and viral vaccines, as well as for diagnostic purposes.

-- Bradley P. Fuhrman, M.D., of Buffalo, professor of pediatrics and anesthesiology, inventor of a method for using an effective, inflammation-reducing amount of a liquid or gaseous fluorocarbon to reduce the inflammatory response in tissues of a patient. Co-inventors are Lynn Hernan, M.D., assistant professor of pediatrics and anesthesiology; Michele Papo, M.D.; David Steinhorn, M.D., associate professor of pediatrics and anesthesiology, and Stephen Flaim. The patent has been licensed to Alliance Pharmaceutical Corp. of San Diego.

-- Jonathan Hull, Ph.D., formerly professor of computer science, inventor of an optical character-recognition method and apparatus that generates a bit-mapped, digitized image of a document. Tao Hong is co-inventor.

-- George C. Lee, Ph.D., of Buffalo, director of the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research and Samuel P. Capen Professor of Engineering and Applied Sciences, inventor of a method and apparatus for real-time, structure-parameter modification. Devices used by the apparatus of this invention can be manufactured readily for immediate application in structures, buildings and contents, and other constructed facilities. Co-inventors are Zhong Liang, Ph.D., research assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, and assistant director of the Laboratory for Animated Structures at UB, and Mai Tong, research instructor in civil, structural and environmental engineering and special assistant to the dean for co-op projects.

-- Daniel D. Cook of Lancaster, laboratory mechanician for the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, inventor of an easy transport seat for seating and transporting physically challenged individuals to and from commercial transport vehicles. Steven Kerbis is co-inventor. Cook also received a patent for a vortex elimination device, suitable for insertion into a container of liquid.

-- Sushil Patel, Ph.D., of Lancaster, principal research scientist of electrical and computer engineering, inventor of an annular furnace capable of delivering precise temperature control that may be used in the heat treatment of many types of material, including superconducting tape. Frederick C. Wong is co-inventor.

-- Scott L. Diamond, Ph.D., formerly associate professor of chemical engineering, inventor of a method for assaying components in an enzyme-protein substrate system. Jung-He Wu is co-inventor.

-- Robert E. Mates, Ph.D., of Buffalo, professor emeritus of mechanical and aerospace engineering, inventor of a non-invasive device for estimating central venous pressure, a device particularly useful for cardiac patients. Dennis Policastro, formerly clinical assistant professor, and Kenneth Peebles, engineering design assistant and senior laboratory equipment designer, are co-inventors.

-- Ramalingham Sridhar, Ph.D., of East Amherst, inventor of a method and apparatus for designing a family of CFET logic circuits for wave pipelining. Zhang Xuguang is co-inventor.

-- Nathan N. Back, Ph.D., of Buffalo, research professor of biochemical pharmacology, inventor of a process for immobilization onto the surfaces of ELISA plates of a compound carrier complex and for immunization. Kalyan R. Anumula is co-inventor.

-- Deborah D. L. Chung, Ph.D., of East Amherst, Niagara Mohawk Professor of Materials Science and professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, inventor of a composite material strain/stress sensor.

-- Jeremy Bruenn, Ph.D., of Buffalo, professor of biological sciences, inventor of capsid polypeptides capable of inhibiting viral packaging. Wensheng Yao is co-inventor.

-- Paul Ehrlich, Ph.D., of Buffalo, inventor of low-density microporous polymers and process, capable of achieving a supercritical condition. Robert Stewart is co-inventor.