Feted research’s good for the heart

A groundbreaking healthy heart probiotic discovered by scientists at University College Cork has won a prestigious invention award.

The Bioscience Invention of the Year award was presented to Dr Catherine Stanton and her team for their discovery of a new probiotic bacterial strain that has cardio-protective properties and is proven to reduce cholesterol by 53% within 12 weeks of consumption.

The research is a result of collaboration between Teagasc, UCC Microbiology, and the Centre for Research in Vascular Biology at UCC, and it is expected there will be strong commercial interest in the innovative project.

The ICT Invention of the Year award went to a team of researchers from the sustainable energy research group at UCC.

The group’s AHU Fault Finder software is aimed at large industrial facilities, where it will automatically identify faults in air handling units which can cost organisations significant time, money, and resources to detect.

The product has already been trialled at five large multinational sites in Ireland and the energy savings identified are expected to ensure it will be commercialised quickly.

The inventors — Dr Dominic O’Sullivan, Dr Marcus Keane, Ken Bruton, and Dr Paul Raftery — are already in negotiations regarding licensing the technology, which has attracted interest from the US, and are in the process of setting up a spin-out company to commercialise the system.

Among the shortlist for the biosciences category was the SmartBandage, which automatically monitors the state of health of the wound and controls the rate of delivery of drugs, thereby reducing recovery time and minimising infection.

Director of technology transfer at UCC, Dr Tim Roche, praised the calibre of entries as “incredible”.

“We are continuously working with inventors to develop and commercialise such highly innovative research and to bring new technologies to the next level,” he said.

“I would expect a number of this year’s entries for the Invention of the Year award to progress to spin-out companies and to be licensed by companies to be brought to market.”

The Invention of the Year competition is part of the UCC Annual Research Commercialisation Awards at which 12 new licences for cutting edge technology in biosciences and ICT were also announced.