Buddy Ratner
2006 Catalyst Article
The 2004–5 academic year was, as has been the case for the last few years, a whirlwind of events, achievements, and transitions. A recent activity that has been keeping me busy is directing a National Academies roundtable group called Biomedical Engineering Materials and Applications (BEMA). This “think tank” group interfacing federal agencies, industry, and academic groups in a “closed door” environment to explore key problems with medical devices has been most stimulating but also fairly time-consuming.
Another activity that continues to grow in importance is a collaboration with Nanyang Technological University in Singapore on a project funded by the Singapore government and the University of Washington to tissue-engineer an esophagus as a surgical replacement. Over the last year, I’ve taken five trips to Singapore (24 hours travel time in each direction) to participate in research, scientific meetings, and administrative meetings.
In April 2005, I received a new endowed chair from the Department of Bioengineering, the Michael L. and Myrna Darland Chair in Technology Commercialization. I have now started two companies. The first, Asemblon, has received funding and will focus on molecular self assembly and hydrogen storage. The second company, Healionics, is now being organized and will bring a package of UW-developed medical device surface modifications to interested medical device companies.
In the fall, I will teach an introductory course on entrepreneurship. The UWEB NSF Engineering Research Center that I direct is entering its tenth year. UWEB is an 11-year program with no options for NSF renewal. So, we are actively exploring new funding options to take UWEB, an effective collaboration of engineers, biologists, and physicians, into the future and into new research areas. Finally, let me congratulate three of my students (two of them ChemEs) who received their PhD degrees this year, Andrew Marshall, Ming Ni, and Xuanhong Cheng.
