COVID finder tech | Virus-killing robot | Sanitizing drones | Health Tech

“Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and to think what nobody else has thought.” — Albert Szent-Györgyi, Hungarian biochemist

Today’s issue:

• COVID finder tech
  
• Virus-killing robot
• Sanitizing drones
• Biotech heats up in North Carolina
  
• Shutdown and autism
• Getting vaccine info to underserved communities
• Health tech

May 12, 2021

PANDEMIC INNOVATION

Image by Adao for Shutterstock

COVID finder tech

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) awarded $199,653 in Phase 1 funding to Farmspace Systems, a veteran-owned start-up based in Alamo, Tenn., to enhance its COVID Finder technology, a non-thermal detection COVID-19 screening method.

Virus-killing robot

Lydia Melles and Lucy Hoang, Wichita State University seniors, are creating a robot to kill COVID-19 germs at McConnell Air Force Base.

Sanitizing drones

The FAA has granted approval to Pittsburgh-based AERA to use drones to sanitize large-scale sports and entertainment venues.

Biotech heats up in North Carolina

The Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines use messenger RNA (mRNA) to fight off the virus. This engineering has touched off a flurry of activity in the biotech sector in several Fast Future cities, specifically in North Carolina. Every year, North Carolina’s universities award 4,900 life sciences and 4,500 engineering degrees.

Shutdown and autism

Brooke Ingersoll, a professor psychology at Michigan State University and the director of its Autism Lab, worked to ensure proper intervention methods during the COVID-19 shutdown. Now she addresses the three areas of concern for autism education in the future.

Getting vaccine info to underserved communities

Northern Kentucky University has set up a program that is focused on getting accurate and timely COVID-19 vaccination information to medically underserved communities.

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FEATURED OPPORTUNITY

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PUDDLE HOPS: HEALTH TECH

Fast Future has followed medical and tech news around COVID-19 from the beginning of the pandemic. We're adding coverage to this report related to health care innovation to feature more advances across Fast Future Country. 

• Grove City biotech Forge Biologics announced a $120 million venture capital round toward expanding its manufacturing capacity, for a cumulative $160 million to date. It's the largest Series B round ever in Ohio. Here’s what this means for Columbus. 

• While small-cell lung cancer usually responds well to chemotherapy, it often returns in a treatment-resistant form that’s usually fatal. Researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center have identified molecular patterns that give insights into a new treatment.
  

• Jason Shearn, an associate professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Cincinnati, is researching how the human body can actually regenerate or fully restore function after an injury.

• Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis are suggesting that the brain’s drainage system could hold the key to unlocking the potential of certain Alzheimer’s therapies.

• Arch Oncology, a biotech startup in St. Louis has raised $105 million in a funding round led by Eventide Asset Management, Cowen Healthcare Investments and 3x5 Partners. The money will be used to further the development of biologic therapies for patients with tumors and hematologic malignancies.

• Researchers at Miami University have been awarded a $1.5 million grant from PsyBio Therapeutics Corp. to expedite progress toward clinical trials of a portfolio of neuropsychiatric drugs.

• Ann Arbor-based Asalyxa Bio, Inc., a biopharmaceutical startup developing nano-engineered, immune cell-targeted therapeutics, closed on an over-subscribed seed financing round totaling more than $2 million.

• AtriCure’s EPi-Sense System has been approved by the FDA for treatment of long-standing persistent Afib patients.

• Nearly one-third of epileptic patients don't respond well to medication. Now, groundbreaking research at Carnegie Mellon University is combining clinical application and engineering innovation to present another option.

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