Invented at Duke 2024 showcases the past and present of innovation at Duke, promising a bright future
Around 300 people from the Duke community and entrepreneurial colleagues from across the Triangle braved the rain to celebrate Duke inventors and innovations at the 6th Annual Invented at Duke event.
Faculty, staff, students, local investors and entrepreneurs, and many more enjoyed food and drink as they networked with each other and explored booths of featured inventors. Attendees saw demos of tunable biopolymers, metamaterial antennas, viscosity testing device, and more as featured inventors from across Duke schools showed off their technologies.
To commemorate Duke’s Centennial, Invented at Duke featured interactive stations with archival materials from historic Duke inventions and a 20-foot-long timeline of the past 100 years of innovation at Duke.
The event’s main feature, however, was nine inventor booths from varying departments and fields. Their inventions ranged from bone healing and metastatic cancer treatment to novel materials with all manner of applications. The researchers, coming from a wide range of career stages, were present to speak to attendees and demonstrate their work.
From medicine to engineering and across the stages of development, each of these projects and their investigators worked closely with Duke’s Office for Translation & Commercialization (OTC), which partnered with them to determine patenting and commercialization strategies. OTC offers inventors mentorship and guidance and connects them to a network of translational resources at Duke and beyond.
OTC has expanded its functions to provide comprehensive support for innovators at Duke – especially through the Gilhuly Accelerator Fund and new initiatives like Duke Translational Chaperones. These efforts were highlighted by speakers, including Associate VP for Translation & Commercialization Robin Rasor, Duke University President Vincent Price, and Director of The Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center Dr. David Ashley. We appreciate Dr. Ashley stepping in when our invited featured speaker, Dr. Robert Califf, was not able to attend.
In addition to inventor booths and centennial displays, Invented at Duke also spotlighted resources for inventors, with 20 organizations, listed in more detail below, showing the different ways they support innovators at Duke. Aspiring inventors, seasoned translational researchers, and students alike had the chance to connect with these supportive organizations that ranged from incubators to external funding, entrepreneurial strategy to experiential education.
As the evening wound down and attendees were filtering out into the chilly night, Duke inventors were given gifts of Centennial paperweights – all the better to pin down their lofty ideas for real-life translation and commercialization. For one hundred years, Duke has fostered groundbreaking innovation, and Duke’s Office for Translation & Commercialization is ready to support Duke’s community of bright innovators today and for years to come.
Invented at Duke 2024 was sponsored by:
Featured Inventors:
Dorothy Sipkins (School of Medicine)
Dr. Dorothy Sipkins is an Associate Professor of medicine and is developing novel antibodies for cancer treatment. Dr. Sipkins’ work reveals how cancer cells can cling to and crawl along blood vessels as a method of metastasis. She is the recipient of an award from the Gilhuly Accelerator Fund.
Shyni Varghese (School of Medicine & Pratt School of Engineering) & Hunter Newman (Pratt School of Engineering)
Dr. Shyni Varghese is a Professor of Orthopodics, MEMS, and BME. Dr. Hunter Newman is a PostDoc in BME and a former OTC Fellow. They’ve devised a drug and delivery method that improves bone fracture healing and reduces pain. It is the core technology of their new start-up OsteoCure.
Junjie Yao, Soon-Woo Cho, and Van Tu Nguyen (Pratt School of Engineering)
Dr. Junjie Yao is an Associate Professor and Drs. Soon-Woo Cho and Van Tu Nguyen are PostDocs in BME. Their device uses photoacoustics for subdermal visualization in real time. They are the recipeints of an award from the Gilhuly Accelerator Fund.
Matthew Becker (Trinity College of Arts & Sciences)
Dr. Matthew Becker is a Professor of Chemistry. He has developed a portfolio of biopolymers for a broad range of health applications, including soft tissue regeneration, surgical mesh, and biodegradable plastic.
Michael Boyarsky (Pratt School of Engineering)
Dr. Michael Boyarsky is a Research Scientist in ECE and received his PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Duke in 2019. Dr. Boyarsky received an award from the Gilhuly Accelerator Fund to develop a metamaterial for satellite imaging. New Duke startup Extellis will spinout the technology.
Justin Pollara and Paul Cray (School of Medicine)
Dr. Justin Pollara is an Associate Professor of Surgery and Dr. Paul Cray is a PostDoc in Dr. Pollara’s lab. Together, the pair are developing a novel mitochondrial gene delivery platform. Dr. Cray is also an OTC Senior Fellow. Their project has received an award from the Gilhuly Accelerator Fund.
Luiz Maracaja and Carmelo Milano (School of Medicine)
Dr. Luiz Maracaja is an Associate Professor of Anesthesiology and Dr. Carmelo Milano is the Chief of the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery. They have developed several devices to keep chests open during and after cardiac surgery.
Jonathan Viventi (Pratt School of Engineering)
Dr. Jonathan Viventi is an Associate Professor in BME. Dr. Viventi has developed flexible electronics for brain implants. Special thanks to Dan Vahaba for usage of brain image on the banner.
Stefan Zauscher and Zehra Parlak (Pratt School of Engineering)
Dr. Stefan Zauscher is Associate Chair and Professor and Dr. Zehra Parlak was a PostDoc in MEMS. They have developed a microfluidics lab on a chip that is now core to the startup Qatch Technologies.
Featured Resources:
Biolabs NC – a unique biotech co-working facility in downtown Durham, North Carolina.
Christensen Family Center for Innovation – advances technology innovation at Duke University and beyond through people, programs, and infrastructure.
Design Climate – two semester course that applies Design Thinking principles to address the most pressing climate challenges and develop innovations in sustainability.
Duke AI Health – concerned with ethical and equitable data science practices, this interdisciplinary research initiative on artificial intelligence and machine learning.
Duke Capital Partners – leverage the power of the global Duke community to invest in and support entrepreneurs, to educate and empower students, and to engage and activate our members’ contributions to the University’s innovation ecosystem.
The Duke Climate Research Innovation Seed Program – distributes grants to advance research aligned with the Duke Climate Commitment.
Duke Clinical and Translational Science Institute – the administrative home for the Duke Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA), overseeing and integrating sixteen CTSA core services into the fabric of translational science at Duke University.
Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship – provides interdisciplinary, experiential education and opportunities to innovators, supporting them in solving the world’s most pressing challenges.
Duke Institute for Health Innovation – catalyzes transformative innovations in health and health care through implementation of high-impact innovations, leadership development, and cultivation of a community of entrepreneurship.
Duke New Ventures – Duke’s startup starting point, turning your intellectual property into a startup company.
Duke Translational Chaperones – a team of commercialization experts that partner with inventors early and guide them through translational strategy, decision making, and resources.
Duke Office for External Partnerships (OEP) – proactively engages with corporations and other potential external partners to understand their needs and match these to Duke assets by means of systematic outreach and internal scouting to identify and realize partnership opportunities originating with faculty, and to demonstrate value to Duke interests.
eLuminate Studio – a graduate-level course in hands-on, end-to-end innovation around real projects.
Four Points Innovation – a strategic partnership between Duke University and Deerfield Management focused on supporting and accelerating the translation of research into new therapies to treat and cure society’s most formidable healthcare challenges.
Innovation Co-Lab – a creativity incubator, focused on exploring how new and emerging technologies can fundamentally reshape the research, academic, and service missions of the university.
myRESEARCHnavigators – ensures that researchers are knowledgeable about relevant resources, collaborators, processes, and best practices for performing research at Duke.
North Carolina Biotechnology Center – create North Carolina’s competitive advantage in the life sciences, engaging partners, maximizing opportunities, and delivering solutions to accelerate innovation, investment, and job creation.
Nucleate – a free and collaborative student-led organization that facilitates the formation of pioneering life sciences companies.
OTC Fellows Program – an exciting opportunity for Duke graduate students and post-doctoral fellows to gain exposure to the process of commercialization of academic science.
Pattern Health – partner with researchers, clinical innovators, and their institutions to develop and implement digital health programs, surveys, and clinical tools.
Precision Microbiome Engineering (PreMiEr)– an NSF-funded Engineering Research Center that enables researchers to study microbiome technologies for the built environment. PreMiEr partners with other universities across Central North Carolina.
More Invented at Duke 2024 coverage:
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