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India needs an effective mechanism to translate its many ongoing novel medical research efforts from labs to industries, according to scientists speaking at ‘emTech', the third annual MIT Technology Review conference on emerging technologies here on Tuesday.
“MIT has an office to do technology transfer. We lack that for signing licence agreements. Very often, projects get stalled and not because of lack good science,” said Dr Chetan Chitnis, Principal Leader, Malaria Group, at the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology. The ICGEB was talking to companies to take its low-cost malaria vaccine work forward, he said.
Research trends
Listing out MIT's formidable array of research, Dr Jeffrey Karp, Director, MIT Lab for Advanced Biomaterials and Stem-Cell-based Therapeutics, said the life sciences division had 5,000 MIT-related companies; these were founded at the rate of 150 a year, employed a million people and attracted funds of $ 10,000 million.
Among today's medical research trends were molecular medicine, stem cells and microchips to deliver drugs. They needed good venture funds and private equities as also an appropriate regulatory environment.
According to Dr D.Balasubramanian, Research Director, L.V.Prasad Eye Research Institute, there was a change in research landscape and institutes were looking at early-stage research using undergraduates; the undergraduate curriculum was also getting overhauled suitably.
HIV vaccine
In Bangalore alone, an HIV vaccine is being pursued by Dr Udaykumar Ranga of the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research. Dr Sanjay Kakkar, Trustee of the Thrombosis Research Institute, said the institute was readying a genetic tool to detect cardiovascular risks in people at least ten years in advance.
Seven of the under-35 innovators from Bangalore are in the India TR35 list put out by MIT's Technology Review India.
They are developing technologies to solve people's common problems. Their presentations will help to move many innovations from ‘lab' to ‘market', according to Cybermedia, the organiser of the two-day event that is focusing on medicine, smart computing and clean energy.
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