Academic entrepreneurs looking to translate their research from the lab to the marketplace often face a daunting challenge: the valley of death. This is the point in the innovation cycle where many technologies meet their demise. It represents the period when opportunities for governmental funding that support fundamental science breakthroughs have been exhausted, at the same time when industry investors are waiting for more testing and finishing touches.
For researchers at Arizona institutions, the Flinn Foundation provides a bridge across this difficult entrepreneurial passage. In 2021, the Flinn Foundation awarded seven $100,000 bioscience Translational Research Seed Grants, including two to researchers in the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University.
Jitendran Muthuswamy, an associate professor of biomedical engineering, is developing a noninvasive brain stimulation treatment for chronic migraines.