Category: New products
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Smartphones Studied to Upgrade Hearing Aids
6 February 2015. Engineers at University of Texas in Dallas are studying the potential of smartphones to boost the ability of hearing aids to help people who are hard of hearing. Electrical engineering professor Issa Panahi is leading a team of engineers and audiologists in a two-year, $522,000 project funded by National Institute on Deafness…
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Robotics Designed for Laundry and Other Uncertain Tasks
6 February 2015. Computer scientists designed and tested decision-making models using artificial intelligence for robots to plan and perform unstructured and ill-defined tasks, from doing household laundry to conducting search-and-rescue operations. The team led by Siddharth Srivastava, now with United Technologies in Berkeley, California and Shlomo Zilberstein from University of Massachusetts in Amherst described their…
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Biochemistry Spin-Off Formed, Gains $45M Funding
4 February 2015. Revolution Medicines Inc., a spin-off enterprise based on research in protein chemistry at University of Illinois, is starting up with $45 million in first-round venture funds. The company is founded by Illinois biochemistry professor Martin Burke, and initially financed by Third Rock Ventures, a San Francisco venture capital firm. Burke’s lab in…
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Multiple Sclerosis Patients to Crowdsource Health Data
3 February 2015. A new initiative, called iConquerMS, is recruiting 20,000 patients with multiple sclerosis in the U.S. to offer their health data and research ideas to find a cure for the disease. iConquerMS is an undertaking of the Accelerated Cure Project for MS, with the research network segment funded by Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute or…
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NIH Grant Funding Stress-Obesity Control System
2 February 2015. A team from University of Massachusetts Medical School and Worcester Polytechnic Institute are creating a smartphone app combined with a cloud-based data store to help people who overeat due to stress control their eating. The system known as the RELAX Application Suite is funded by a 3-year, $2 million grant from National…
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Cancer Progress Indicators Devised
29 January 2015. Researchers in public health and cancer medicine developed statistical tools that capture findings on cancer treatments and care, and provide indicators of progress in defeating the disease. A team from Lilly Oncology — with colleagues from the U.S., Germany, U.K., and Italy — published its findings about the Continuous Innovation Indicators initiative…
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Material Developed to Prevent Li-Ion Battery Fires
28 January 2015. Materials scientists and engineers at University of Michigan designed a new material to better protect lithium-ion batteries from starting fires like the kind on Boeing 787 Dreamliners. The team from the lab of engineering professor Nicholas Kotov published its findings yesterday in the journal Nature Communications (paid subscription required). Kotov and first…
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Cartilage 3-D Printed to Repair Windpipe
27 January 2015. Researchers at Feinstein Institute for Medical Research in Manhasset, New York devised techniques using a commercial three-dimensional printer for creating cartilage to repair or replace a human trachea or windpipe. Doctoral candidate Todd Goldstein, working in the lab of orthopedic researcher Daniel Grande, presented his proof-of-concept findings at this week’s meeting of…
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Stem Cells Shown Effective with Autism in Lab
26 January 2015. The biotechnology company BrainStorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. reports that tests in laboratory mice show its stem cell technology derived from bone marrow is effective in reducing behaviors associated with autism. The study was conducted by Daniel Offen, a neuroscientist at Tel Aviv University in Israel, but no peer-reviewed publication was cited by…
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XPrize Awards $5.25M for Lunar Technologies
26 January 2015. A competition to develop new technologies for landing and robotic exploration of the moon awarded $5.25 million in 9 prizes to 5 private companies, as part of the Google Lunar XPrize challenge. The companies — from the U.S., Germany, Japan, and India — received the prizes for their design and development of…