UB to Honor 38 at Annual Inventors Reception

BUFFALO, N.Y. - Thirty-eight individuals named on patents issued to The Research Foundation of State University of New York in 2000 will be honored when the University at Buffalo holds its annual inventors reception on May 16.

Presented by the Office of Technology Transfer and Licensing in the UB Business Alliance, the reception will be held at 5:30 p.m. in Room 210 of the Student Union on the UB North (Amherst) Campus.

The reception will follow a seminar designed to help new investigators at UB negotiate the steps involved in commercializing their research.

The seminar and reception will be part of a Research Festival sponsored by the UB Office of the Vice President for Research, in association with the associate deans for research in various UB schools.

The inventors to be honored are:

o David Pendergast and John Zaharkin, Department of Physiology and Biophysics; Michael Zaharkin, formerly associated with the department, and Budd Termin, Division of Athletics, who invented a system and method for improving the biomechanics, distance-per-stroke and aerobic metabolism of a swimmer

o Deborah D.L. Chung, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, who invented a new sensor configuration in which compression of the sensor can be correlated to strain or stress

o Stella Batalama and Dimitris Pados, Department of Electrical Engineering, who invented a new circuitry and method for demodulating Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) signals

o George Lee and Zhong Liang, Department of Civil Engineering and Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research, who developed a seismic accelerometer to measure and record low frequencies and large dynamic measurement ranges

o Abir Mullick, Department of Architecture, who invented a modular bathing unit that can be configured to the needs and preferences of its users.

o Huw Davies, Department of Chemistry, and collaborators Norman King and Steven Childers, who invented biologically active derivatives of the tropane ring system that selectively bind either to the 5-HT or DA reuptake site, leading to compounds that can be used to treat clinical depression, attention deficit disorder, obesity and cocaine addiction

o Claes Lundgren and Ingvald Tyssebotn, Department of Physiology and Biophysics, and the Center for Research in Special Environments, and former UB collaborators Hugh Van Liew and Mark Burkard, who invented a method of treating right-to-left circulatory shunts by introducing a therapeutically effective amount of stabilized micro-bubbles

o Donald Hickey, Department of Physiology and Biophysics, who invented a two-balloon esophageal catheter and monitoring system. Hickey received funding through the Center for Applied Biomedical and Bioengineering Technologies (CABBT) to develop the operating software and hardware prototype.

o Darrell Doyle and Paul Gollnick, Department of Biological Sciences, and collaborators Marian Kruzel and Tomasz Kurecki, who invented a method of using genetically engineered bacteria to produce human lactoferrin in large quantities. The patent is issued to FerroDynamics Inc.

o Brydon Grant and Ali El-Sohl, Department of Medicine, who developed a type of software programming, called an artificial neural network, that generates a predicted respiratory disturbance index that can assist clinicians in further diagnosing respiratory conditions

o Timothy Murphy and Kyungcheol Yi, Department of Medicine and Division of Infectious Diseases, who invented a vaccine-delivery system that is applicable to an extensive range of vaccine candidates

o Frank Bright and Luis Colon, Department of Chemistry, and former UB collaborators Jeffrey Jordan and Richard Dunbar, who invented a method of forming sol-gel derived thin films and their applications

o Paul Kostyniak and Joseph Syracuse, Toxicology Research Center; Ross Giese, Department of Geology, and former UB collaborator Patricia Costanzo, who developed a method of conducting a cation exchange that imparts antimicrobial properties to colloid particles as clays. The resulting antimicrobial composition has a number of potential applications, including as an additive to plastics, paints or a variety of household products.

o Robert Genco and Richard Evans, Department of Oral Biology; Robert Coburn, Department of Medicinal Chemistry, and collaborator Joseph Dunn, who invented a method of treating chronic inflammation using the subject compounds. A group of patents for the compounds is licensed to Therex Technologies, which is directed by Dunn. Genco is SUNY Distinguished Professor and chair of the Department of Oral Biology in the UB School of Dental Medicine and director of CABBT.