Industrial collaborations

This fund supports research collaborations that address societal challenges of interest both to industry and to academic scientists and engineers. Industry often plays an essential role in bringing the innovations of University researchers to fruition and making them available to society at large. The program requires an agreement from the industry collaborator to provide matching funds in the second year of the project. Awardees are:

Time-resolved breath oxygen monitor for critical care

Gerard Wysocki, associate professor of electrical engineering, and his team will develop a highly sensitive laser-based sensor in collaboration with Hamamatsu Photonics, a leading instrumentation company. During critical care of patients in respiratory distress, measuring the consumption of oxygen in the breath can provide important information about the patient's health. The resulting prototype, capable of detecting not only oxygen concentration but the types (or isotopes) of oxygen, will be evaluated by collaborators in a hospital setting.

Novel nanostructured complex fluids for biofilm removal

Howard Stone, Princeton's Donald R. Dixon '69 and Elizabeth W. Dixon Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, will team with Princeton, NJ, medical device firm NovaFlux Inc. to explore the ability of a new cleaning fluid composed of nano-sized fibers and micro-sized particles suspended in a liquid. Stone and colleagues at NovaFlux will explore the fluid's ability to remove bacterial coatings, or biofilms, which form on surfaces such as medical tubing and devices. The fluid can also be used to remove a broad range of pathogens including bacteria, spores and viruses.