Six UC Davis inventions ranging from supersharp razor blades to a diagnostic test for tuberculosis have won funding through the UC system’s Proof of Concept program.

The grants of about $100,000 each are intended to help the inventors take their ideas to the level at which they might be of interest to potential investors.

Many promising ideas get stuck in the funding gap between academic research — which is often supported by federal grants — and full commercialization, supported by private investors. UC launched the Proof of Concept Commercialization Gap Grants, or PoC Program, in 2011 to help UC inventors cross that gap.

For 2012, UC awarded 22 projects at six campuses and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. To be eligible, projects must aim at technology that could be licensed or spur a start-up company within one or two years.

Here are the successful projects from UC Davis:

Better anesthetics — Robert Brosnan, associate professor in the School of Veterinary Medicine, has invented a method for designing new anesthetic drugs with selective cellular actions. This invention may be applied to develop safer agents with fewer side effects that allow faster recovery times from general anesthesia.

TB test — Professor Alexander Revzin's laboratory in the Department of Biomedical Engineering has developed a simple, rapid test for latent tuberculosis infection. The test promises to be cheaper and faster than current testing technology.

Bone repair — Kent Leach, professor of biomedical engineering, has developed a material that can be injected at the site of damaged bone to encourage stem cells to settle and grow into new bone. The product has been used successfully in horses at the UC Davis Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital and could eventually be applied in human medicine.

Better razors — Ceramic blades maintain a sharp, clean edge longer than metallic blades, but the expense of ceramic blades limits their use to high-end kitchen knives and surgical tools. Professor Saif Islam, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and colleagues have designed a method for making affordable ceramic blades that could be used for shaving.

Growing stem cells — Professor Kit Lam, chair of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine in the School of Medicine, and colleagues have invented a series of novel, "made to order" three-dimensional gels that can be tailored to grow specific types of cells, including stem cells and cancer cells. The gels could be used, for example, to study how stem cells develop into other types of cells.

Radiation detectors — Professor Daniel Ferenc, Department of Physics, has developed a new type of inexpensive photosensor that could replace 80-year-ol technology based on vacuum tubes. The new photosensors could be used in medical imaging, as radiation detectors for homeland security, and in experimental physics research.

UC Davis research has spun off more than 40 start-up companies since July 2003. Today, the university's Office of Research manages a portfolio of 411 U.S. and 423 foreign patents; licensing of these and other intellectual property brought income of more than $11 million in fiscal year 2011.

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