Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center Launches Wake Forest Innovations

Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center has created a new operating division to translate its academic and clinical research and discoveries into marketable products and services that will benefit patients. The new enterprise, Wake Forest Innovations, is being led by Chief Innovation Officer Eric Tomlinson, DSc, and Ph.D., who is also President of the Piedmont Triad Research Park.

The new division provides the institution with several new services:

Product Innovation & Commercialization Services is responsible for supporting the creation of innovative technology and products and commercializing these through licensing to existing and startup companies.

Scientific Business Services is a newly-formed business support group that helps to structure, promote and contract our research assets to external partners.

Park Development Services is focused on the growth of the Piedmont Triad Research Park –home for 10 Wake Forest Baptist departments and 30 companies – as a vibrant, knowledge-based community.  More.

Wake Forest's Atala Named to Power List

Anthony Atala, MD, director of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine, has been named to AARP Magazine’s “Power List – 50 People Who Make Your Life Better.”

Atala is one of 10 people over age 50 recognized for “Moving Us to a Healthier Future” for his team’s work to engineer replacement organs in the lab. AARP is one of the top-circulation magazines in the U.S., with more than 23 million readers.  More.

Tech Speaker Series Returns! New Technology Resources to Grow Your Business

“New Advanced Technology Resources to Grow Your Business”

Tuesday, December 11

8:30 - 9:30 a.m. (networking & refreshments follow)

Did you know that within Winston-Salem’s Piedmont Triad Research Park some of the most advanced equipment and resources in the Southeast are now being made available to entire community? Our next Tech Speaker Series event on Tuesday, December 11 at 8:30 a.m. in Wake Forest Biotech Place will tell you all about it! Do you quickly need a prototype for a new product? Or access to cutting-edge medical research equipment? Come learn about what is available and how these items can help take your business to the next level.

Speakers

• Eric Tomlinson, DSc, PhD; President, Piedmont Triad Research Park and Chief Innovation Officer, Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center
• Luke Burnett, PhD; Chief Science Officer, Keranetics
• Tom Clarkson, Associate Director, Entrepreneurship; Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center
• Carol Strohecker, PhD; Director, Center for Design Innovation

Wake Forest Biotech Place

575 N. Patterson Avenue

Winston-Salem, NC 27101 Map

Hosted by the Tech Council of the Winston-Salem Chamber of Commerce.  Free and open to the public though registration is required.  Learn more and register.

Title Sponsor

·               Cook Medical

Series Sponsors:

·               B/E Aerospace
       Kilpatrick Townsend
    Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center

Food Sponsor  

          Gallins Foods

Hybrid 3-D Printer Used to Create Cartilage Implants at Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine

Scientists at the Wake Forest Institute of Regenerative Medicine have pioneered an approach to replace damaged cartilage, combining two low-cost techniques.

The team’s breakthrough mixes electrospinning with medical inkjet printing, also called bioprinting. 

The development has potential for the medical field. Injured natural cartilage is slow and difficult to heal, and has almost no ability to regrow itself. Currently, surgeons treat cartilage damage caused from injury or disease with techniques that remove small pieces of torn tissue or create microscopic grafts. But as of yet, they have been unable to fully regenerate the cushioning, lubricating tissue that keeps joints moving freely and bones from wearing against each other. As a result, degenerative cartilage conditions can eventually result in joint replacement surgery.

This new procedure may effectively eradicate these invasive procedures and spell relief for countless people who suffer from cartilage conditions. Read more.

PTRP innovation among top priorities for Eric Tomlinson

People may know Eric Tomlinson as the president named this summer to head the Piedmont Triad Research Park, but for him, it’s his second title — chief innovation officer for Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center — that’s most important.

“When I was approached for the job, it was president of PTRP, and oh, by the way, chief innovation officer of Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center,” Tomlinson said. “But actually the job is chief innovation officer, of which part is to develop the park.”

That change speaks to a shift in focus for the research park, which includes 145 developable acres next to the heart of downtown. The park is expected to support more than 6 million square feet of building space as it’s built out.

Earlier this year saw the opening of Wake Forest Biotech Place, followed by the announcement that Winston-Salem-based Inmar will relocate its 900 workers to the park. Employment in the park is expected to approach 2,000 by the end of 2013, with hundreds of thousands of renovated square feet coming online.  Read more.

Time Magazine Touts Wake Forest Helmet Research

Scientists at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center are Making Football Safer
At Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, researchers are collecting data from youth players wearing helmets equipped with sensors that can record the direction and force of a hit.  This information will be paired with brain scans and cognitive tests of players taken at the beginning of the season and could ultimately be used to build better commercial helmets.  Read more.

Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine in the News

Dr. Anthony Atala, director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, is used to hearing his work described as science fiction.  

Way back in 1999, he and his team grew bladders in a lab and successfully implanted them in patients with spina bifida. Then in 2004, his team grew urethras for five boys in Mexico City. Eight years later, the laboratory-grown tissue looks as natural as the boys' own.

Today, scientists are growing more than 30 types of tissues and organs at the Wake Forest Institute in Winston-Salem, N.C. The hard work of growing vital organs "is a major challenge," Atala says. Although his lab has already grown a set of lungs, so far they're only experimental. "It should be only a matter of time before we create solid organs" such as livers and hearts, he says.

Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center researchers are also testing a spray-on skin that could greatly reduce the way skin grafts are collected for burn patients.  Read more.

Piedmont Triad Research Park president shares vision

Eric Tomlinson became president of Piedmont Triad Research Park on July 2. A scientist and biopharmaceutical expert, he has assumed the role of guiding the park through its most pivotal growth spurt since its founding in the late 1990s. The park is considered by many to be the leading new-economy engine for the region.

Tomlinson presented a personal introduction, an infrastructure update and his vision for the park during a presentation Tuesday at Wake Forest BioTech Place.

The park's workforce will expand from about 850 now to more than 2,100. It will go from 400,000 square feet of space to 1 million and double in investment from its current $175 million to $350 million.

Tomlinson spoke of having more people living, working and playing in the area, projecting a fifth housing loft development and 130 more downtown residents adjacent to the park's boundaries. By spring 2014, significant work is expected to be completed on the Bailey Green Park and the 26-mile "rails-to-trails" greenway.  Read more.

Biden visits Wake Forest Biotech Place in Winston-Salem

Vice President Joe Biden spoke Wednesday at Wake Forest Biotech Place in Winston-Salem, encouraging scientific research and highlighting the type of job creation needed in a changing economy.

Biden spoke to a large crowd at a former R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company facility that now houses cutting-edge biotechnology research. The location opened in February and is expected to bring 450 researchers and support staff to the Piedmont Triad Research Park.

Biden was introduced by Carolina Liquid Chemistries President Phil Shugart. Shugart, whose company is located at Wake Forest Biotech Place, recounted the story of his father and grandfather growing tobacco in the same place that he would later build a chemical engineering plant. More.

Promoting student interest in science, technology, engineering and math

When Stephen Susalka went searching for mentors last year to coach 9-to 14-year-olds for a robotics initiative that culminated with a competition last December, he found a lot of support from co-workers at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center.

The goal behind the initiative, tied to the international FIRST LEGO League Robotics tournament, is promoting science, technology, engineering and math knowledge and learning as possible careers for students.

“I work closely with the chamber, and one of the things we recognized is we’re not turning out enough STEM-interested students. And you lose them at middle school,” Susalka says. “So we wanted to provide a STEM learning experience that would engage those students.” Read more.