Fusion — Disciplines — Science — 2011–12
2011–12 Scientific Focus
Nerve Stimulation & Neuromodulation
Northern Ohio is home to a broad array of world-class research in electrical stimulation — and to a set of commercialization problems that are unusually hard in an unusually instructive way.
The regional base includes work at the Cleveland Clinic, University Hospitals, Case Western Reserve University, the Cleveland Functional Electrical Stimulation Center, and the Advanced Platform Technology Center at the Louis Stokes VA Medical Center, alongside a growing community of spin-offs and start-ups including Intelect Medical, Neuros Medical, and Synapse Biomedical.
Through the year, biomedical engineer and emeritus professor Dr. J. Thomas Mortimer provided students with the scientific fundamentals of nerve stimulation, building an understanding of the functional parameters and the state of the science. His lectures doubled as a living case study in device development, tracking his own team's research in diaphragm stimulation from the early 1980s through to the commercialization of that core technology by Synapse Biomedical.
In parallel, student teams worked to understand and cultivate active invention disclosures in the field, each building a distinct picture of the clinical and commercial opportunity their discovery presented, and working through the year to construct an investment case for the product concept that emerged.
Method patents and surgical methods. Many discoveries here concern the therapeutic implications of stimulating a precise anatomical target, while offering little patentable ground around the device — leads, pulse generators — or the system dynamics such as firmware and implantable energy systems that a marketable product requires. Teams learn to tackle that by examining multiple commercialization strategies, partnering potential, and the development or acquisition of competing component technologies.
Integration and systems
Scientifically, few innovations arrive as a fully integrated product. Commercializing stimulation products demands a creative focus on value chain, component development, and interdisciplinary approaches to engineering something complete.
Pre-clinical proof of concept
The path to market for these often-invasive devices runs through extensive regulatory review and clinical demonstration. But reaching trials at all requires persistent, creative work to develop early indications of safety and efficacy in humans. Students work with clinicians and IRB members to understand what strategies actually produce that early data.