Nanotechnology category

3D Biomatrix
3D Biomatrix will offer Perfecta3D, a novel 3D substrate within a standard well-plate, to the in vitro cellular drug testing market. Currently, the development of a drug can cost up to $900 million and 12 years, sometimes failing late in clinical trials. Perfecta3D will alleviate a critical pain to the pharmaceutical industry, which is the lack of adequate ex vivo models for different organs and tissues for drug testing, which can replace 2D cell cultures, which have poor predictive capacity. In providing a 3D cellular drug testing assay, we will be entering the in vitro drug testing and cellular assay markets, which reached $400M and $90M in 2006, respectively; these markets are expected to have an annual growth rate of 10% in the next five years. Another potential market, high content screening assays, is projected to reach $140.5M in 2013. Based on these strong markets, and speaking to our current customers and collaborators, we have predicted revenues and and income of almost $20M and $10M in five years, respectively, becoming cash flow positive in two years. The structure of Perfecta3D is that of an inverted colloidal crystal, consisting of empty spherical cavities arranged in a hexagonal array, providing a consistent and fully interconnected structural 3D microenvironment. The chosen material, polyacrylamide hydrogel, provides a nontoxic, transparent, and hydrophilic (70% water) environment for cell culture. Its high degree of order increases experimental reproducibility, and its transparency allows for use with common luminescence-based assays. Surface chemistry, topography, stiffness, and signal release can be adjusted by adding and varying the composition of nanostructured layers of polymers, nanoparticles, or biomolecules/factors. The structure and application of our substrate is protected by three U.S. patents, and is met by little competition. Overall, Perfecta3D is a strong technology that will satisfy a large unmet need in the pharmaceutical industry, and is poised to enter large and growing markets.

ANANAS Nanotech
ANANAS-nanotech is a Start up company in its early stage of development. Following awards at the 2006 Veneto Start-Cup and National Innovation Prizes, It was founded in March 2007 as a Spin-off of the University of Padova. It originates from a discovery in the field of wet nanotechnology, made by a group of scientists with international expertise in Pharmaceutical Sciences and biotechnology, with potential applications in diagnostics and nanomedicine. The ANANAS-nanotech proprietary technology allows the production of stable, biocompatible and biodegradable ?empty? nanoparticles that, thanks to their innovative composition, can be loaded by a self-assembly process with a high-copy number of other compounds selected from a virtually infinite pool of chemicalbiochemical functions. The potentially infinite combination of chemical entities that can simultaneously be assembled on the ANANAS ?nanocores? surface allows a wide variety of applications in different fields, (e.g. diagnostics, surface biofunctionalization, drug delivery) As an example, the empty ?pockets? of the ANANAS ?nanocores? can partially filled with a drug, a radionuclide or a signal-generating function, while the remaining sites can be loaded with ?targeting? functions which can guide the nanoassembly towards defined locations. The targeting function acts as a bus driver taking the passengers to their final destination. If the driver is an antibody recognizing a diseased site in the body (e.g. a tumor) and the passengers are pharmaceutical compounds able to treat such disease, the nanoparticle will function as a drug-delivery system; If the passengers are signal-generating compounds (light, radioactivity..) the particle will function as diagnostic tool applicable both in vivo and in vitro. The ANANAS-nanotech team is composed of four scientists and two experts with industrial experience in business planning, start-up development strategy and management. ANANAS-nanotech Mission is to develop: Innovative solutions for high sensitivity in vitro diagnostics. Nanosystems for site-directed drug-delivery and in vivo diagnostics.

GaST
The proposal intends to exploit the techniques of laser absorption spectroscopy for remote gas sensing applications. This is a rapidly emerging field thanks to the presence on the market of compact, reliable and cheap solid-state laser systems in the visible and infrared made possible by nanotechnology developments. Custom design of laser systems will be developed with nanotechnology techniques to satisfy the requirements for the applications. The target focus of the first products is the wine field, in particular two sensors for the measurement of pressure and content of Carbon Dioxide inside sparkling wine bottles and of Oxygen inside bottles. The control of the content of Carbon Dioxide is essential to distinguish between different classes of sparkling wines regulated by the legislation. The control of Oxygen is important to assess the aging process. Both instruments will be produced as devices to be installed on bottling machines and as stand-alone models. Our device will be far superior than the conventional systems used at present, that do not use laser techniques, because it allows in-line, rapid, non-invasive and non-destructive measurements. The choice of the wine market field is of great logistic importance for Veneto, because this region is at the forefront of wine production and here are located the few wine bottling machinery main producers of the worlds. In parallel, we plan to start activities exploring other market niches where our gas sensors could be applied, as medical diagnostics of the expired breath and measurements of the CO2 content in natural gas and in the combustion processes.

MicroTransponder, Inc
MicroTransponder, Inc. is seeking to commercialize a a novel nanotechnology that can be used as a component for neural and chemical sensing. The MicroTransponder, Inc. technology portfolio consists of a wireless micro-system (?the platform?) that can interface with peripheral nerves (patent pending) and a host of biochemical micro/nano- sensors (?sensors?). Powered wirelessly via a coil over on the skin, the platform receives signals to stimulate nerves for the treatments of intractable pain or neuropathy. Originally developed under the DARPA Revolutionary Prosthetics program, the MicroTransponder technology has been retooled from its original purpose to provide a superior treatment for intractable pain. The Company?s management team includes two of the top neurostimulation experts in the United States. Dr. Larry Cauller has been at the forefront of neuroengineering for over a decade and Dr. Richard Wiener is considered the pioneer in the use of peripheral nerve stimulation to treat pain. The company controls the dominant patent in the area of peripheral nerve stimulation and is patenting the most advanced electrode technology to date (improved through the DARPA Revolutinizing Prosthetics Program), which is the core proprietary technology for the neurostimulation industry*. The company has already raised $100,000 in seed funding and seeks $1.2M in capital to deliver a FDA approved prototype by late 2008. We want license or sell to an existing medical device firm with sales and manufacturing capabilities. As detailed in the following plan, Management is pursuing an integrated funding approach, seeking government sponsored small business grants (STTR/SBIR) in addition to venture capital infusions.

NANOSOLAR
Saving energy is one of the key economic and environmental challenges of the twenty-first century. Energy efficiency is the quickest and most cost-effective way of reducing energy use and greenhouse CO2emissions. In particular, low E and solar control glass windows for buildings and automotive respectively can reduce these consumption in cold and in warm climates, about 30%, and consequently the CO2 emission. Present solutions are: solar control in vehicles for warm climate (laminated glasses by multilayer IR reflective film) and low-E in building for cold climate (by multilayer sputtered coating). These solutions involve sputtering depositions, and the market is expecting nanoglass technology for both. The new proposed approach is based on the repelling of thermal radiation by coating the glass windows with a nanoparticles (NP) doped hybrid material with the following intrinsic features:
- NP size below 20nm and defined lattice structure
- transparency >85%, anti-schratch if required, chemical aging resistance
- refractive index with high real part in the visible range and nearly zero for 750???1200nm and high absorbance for ??1200nm
- Simple and low cost monolayer coating deposition
Such material will be developed by a specifically designed sol-gel hybrid materials doped by ITO NP. Sol gel process offers the advantages of a broad choice of deposition techniques and possibility of tailoring mechanical, optical and chemical properties.
This approach becomes the alternative to the low-E multilayer coating both in cold and warm climates, with larger visible transmission, lower cost and no investment of sputtering technology.
R&D will be concentrated on sol-gel process combined with a innovative deposition techniques using a magnetic field to polarized solvent and ionized ozone able to realize droplets with diameters <3?m without high pressure spray nozzle like in aerosol. Therefore, solvent evaporates before NP deposition, giving high homogeneity of the coating. In conclusion the described nanotechnology involves NP, nanocomposite binder and also a nanoprocess for deposition.

QID
QID Srl is a high technology market-oriented private company with headquarters in Verona and labs to be opened opened in Trieste at the Area Science Park. QID offers new low cost catalysts named QID PT to replace rare and expensive material as Platinum and Rhodium used broadly in many industries and clean technologies. This offers a limitless and very rich market for expansion. Examples include automotive, environment, pollution control, oil refinement, and hydrogen production and fuell cell technology. QID Platinum and Rhodium substituting products are based on nanotechnology and the new and unexpected properties that materials exhibit at the nanoscale, due to the appearance of QuantoMechanical effects. QID?s mission is to exploit these new behaviours and patent new materials. Edge technology such as synchrotron light will be used to speed research and time to market. The R&D approach will give in about 9 months the first nanotechnology catalysts to market and patent. The unique advantage of the planned approach will also provide the best solution formula and processes to patent any other material that could be close to it. QID focus is to develop high value materials and processes based on cutting edge nanotechnology research developed in over 20 years by its founders.

Quantagene
The Human Genome Project took over 13 years and cost $4 Billion dollars until a first draft sequence of the human genome was presented. The sequencing method used for this project is called Sanger sequencing. This classical sequencing method is the most common sequencing technology serving a global market that exceeded $7 billion in 2006. However, the cost, time, and complexity associated with this method has limited the application of sequencing within the genetic analysis market. By using a novel, high throughput, massively parallel sequencing method developed by Quantagene, called Nanopore Optical Sequencing (NOS), the bottlenecks associated with today?s sequencing methods are eliminated, enabling rapid, affordable, and sensitive sequencing of whole genomes within a day. This capability will revolutionize the understanding, diagnosis, monitoring and treatment of disease. In addition the benefits of deciphering entire genomic information will be available to nearly everyone as the cost per genome can be reduced to only a few thousand dollars. Quantagene intends to be a leading developer, manufacturer, and marketer of sequencing products and services that serve the life science community. The company will provide research institutions and ultimately medical care providers with low-cost sequencing machines and materials that will allow them to more efficiently correlate genetic variation and biological function, thus enhancing drug discovery and clinical research, allowing diseases to be detected earlier, and permitting better choices of drugs for individual patients.