Projects
Diagnosing brain injuries at point-of-care: investigating the areas of greatest
Contact: Patrick Beldon, Cortirio Mentor: Dr. Julian White Two thirds of the world’s population lack access to basic medical imaging facilities. This is particularly important in the area of head injuries where a rapid accurate diagnosis can make dramatic differences to treatment and long-term recovery. Cortirio are developing a simple-to-use, portable, low-cost headband device to…
Finding the best market for the next generation of biosensors
Contact: HexagonFab Biosensors, a spin-off from University of Cambridge Dr. Ruizhi Wang, Electrical Engineering, Dr. Hannah Stern, Physics & Chemistry & Christoph von Bieberstein, Commercial Mentor: Brian Corbett The inventors have designed a new real-time and highly sensitive method for detecting trace amounts of biological molecules, including proteins, small molecules and DNA frag-ments, and are…
A new targeted method to reduce platelets in the bloodstream
Contact: Dr. Marloes Tijssen, TroMegaTherapeutics (formerly at Haematology) Mentor: Dr. Bill Matthews Essential Thrombocythaemia is a chronic disease with increased blood platelet numbers and affects over 9000 patients in the UK, but has no specific treatment. Patients can survive up to 20 years post-diagnosis on current treatments, but these have many side effects and do…
Using nanopores to detect single molecules such as proteins or
Contacts: Niklas Ermann, Nikki Weckman & Ulrich Keyser, Biological & Soft Systems, Cavendish Laboratory Mentor: Paul May A nanopore is a single pore a few nanometres in diameter. The team in the Cavendish are developing ways to use nanopores to detect single molecules of specific types, allowing the development of rapid diagnostic tests for diseases…
Wireless neonatal monitoring
Inventors: Oliver Bonner & Dr. Joan Lasenby, Engineering & Dr Kathy Beardsall, Consultant Neonatologist, Addenbrooke’s Mentor: Dr. Oriane Chausiaux In the UK, the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) cares for approximately 95,000 critically ill newborn babies per year, including many who are born prematurely. The care provided is among the most intensive, specialised and high dependency…
Identifying the need for monitoring extracellular fluids in brain injuries,
Inventor: Dr Tanya Hutter, Chemistry Mentor: Bob Pettigrew Microdialysis is a sampling technique that is used for continuous measurement of free, unbound analyte concentrations in the extracellular fluid of a tissue. The inventors have developed a new method to detect several chemical molecules simultaneously in microdialysis fluid. This means they can detect these molecules very…
Designing a screening device for ovarian cancer
Inventor: Dr. Elizabeth Moore, Obstetrics & Gynaecology at Addenbrookes Hospital & Cancer Research UK Mentor: Dr. Marc Bax Ovarian cancer is typically difficult to diagnose by symptoms alone, with the result that many cases are not diagnosed until the cancer is at a late stage. The current blood test which is used as the first…
A new method of identifying the genes behind complex genetic
Inventor: Dr. Luba Chakalova, SNPr Mentor: Bill Matthews Complex genetic diseases are influenced by multiple genes, with examples including diabetes, psychiatric disorders and autoimmune diseases. Numerous genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have been carried out to identify the hot spots in the chromosomes which are involved in the pathology of these diseases. These areas are marked…
Using AI based micro drones to improve crop yields and
Inventor: Dr. Sohab Sarfraz, Speedy Quarks Mentor: Kevin Gooding Global food production needs to increase by 50% by 2050 to meet the expected increase in world population. Precision agriculture is one such technique to better target the use of water, fertiliser and pesticides to the plants that actually need them. This gives better results for…