Research NewsletterIssue: ORN-2025-12

• Special Announcements
• Grant Opportunity Alerts
• Recent Research Grant and Contract Awards
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  • National Science Foundation
  • National Institutes of Health
  • Department of Defense
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  • National Endowment for the Humanities

Want to know?

How to get a patent (IP) on your research and bring your innovation to applications and market for societal benefits?

How to develop an innovation partnership for additional funding opportunities in translational research?

How to form a start-up and follow up on tech transfer with NJIT IP and Technology Transfer Office?

Want an opportunity to network with NJIT Trustee Elisa Charters and other Trustees and industry leaders?

Then join us with your students at the

CTR Workshop on

Intellectual Property and Tech Transfer in Translational Research - Value Creation in Partnerships

Sponsored by

NSF ART (Accelerating Research Translation) Program at NJIT

National Academy of Inventor (NAI) – NJIT Chapter

Date and Venue: April 3, 2025, 9.00 AM – 3.30 PM; Atrium, Campus Center

(light lunch will be served)

Registration Requested: Please Click Here to Register by March 31, 2025

Full Announcement and Additional Information: Click here 

Brief Description: The Center for Translational Research is committed to promoting excellence in collaborative research, innovation partnerships, entrepreneurial pathways, education, training and infrastructure development to translate technology into applications with a high societal and economic impact. To follow up on the CTR mission to enhance the research, innovation and technology entrepreneurship ecosystem at NJIT, we have initiated a series of workshops on pathways to translational research and innovation partnerships, with panel discussions and breakout sessions giving faculty, postdocs and students an opportunity to interact with experts on early and advanced translational research, tech transfer, licensing and funding strategies for entrepreneurial activities.

The CTR Workshop on Intellectual Property and Tech Transfer in Translational Research - Value Creation in Partnerships on April 3, 2025 will focus on the processes of acquisition of Intellectual Property and technology transfer (such as licensing or formation of start-up companies) activities towards potential commercialization for value creation and innovation translation to market for societal benefits.   

Who Should Attend: Faculty, research staff, undergraduate and graduate students and postdocs and external partners who are pursuing or are interested in pathways to translational research and innovation with technology development for use-inspired applications and societal benefit should attend and would be benefited from the workshop.

Why You Should Attend: You will have the opportunity to learn about expectations and perspectives of inventors, innovation partners and stakeholders in academia and industry for successful technology transfer in translational research towards commercialization. The distinguished keynote and panel sessions will present recent trends, challenges and pathways for developing seamless partnerships in value creation to bring technology innovations to market for societal benefits and economic impact. The workshop will also highlight the recent developments at the USPTO towards streamlining the IP acquisition processes including patent application submission. The participants will also have an opportunity to participate in the breakout session to learn about the NJIT’s new Technology Transfer Office with open discussion on licensing and enterprise development processes.

Registered attendees will be able to submit their questions for the breakout sessions for experts to follow up with open discussion. 

Agenda

9.00 AM – 10.00 AM:   General Registration and Meet & Greet Networking with Breakfast

10.00 AM – 10.15 AM: Welcome Remarks and Program Outline

Atam Dhawan, Senior Vice Provost and Executive Director – CTR

Teik Lim, President, NJIT

10.15 AM -11.00 AM:   Distinguished Keynote Presentation

Elisa Charters, Founder, Juego.Juegos and Trustee, NJIT Board of Trustees 

11.00 AM - 12.00 PM: Distinguished Panel Session: Translational Research and Tech Transfer Processes in Academia and Industry

Jeffrey Cartmell, Senior Director, Intellectual Property and Grants, MTF Biologics

Yuhong Jiang, CEO, Purenanotech, Inc.  

Somenath Mitra, Distinguished Professor, CES and Executive Director, York Center for Environmental Sciences and Engineering, NJIT

Judith Sheft, Executive Director, NJ Commission on Science, Innovation & Technology

12.00 PM - 12.45 PM:   Lunch with Experts – Roundtable Assigned Seats Networking

12.45 PM - 1.30 PM:     Breakout Session -1: Technology Transfer and Licensing Translation     Research - NJIT IP Acquisition

Cesar Bandera, Leir Chair in Leadership, Entrepreneurship, and Management; Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship

Shawn Chester, Associate Vice Provost for Research Collaborations

Sherie Dodson, Associate Director for Technology Transfer & Intellectual Property

Sanjiv Chokshi, Esq, Associate General Counsel

·      Overview of IP Protection

·      Invention Disclosures

·      Provisional Patent Applications

1.30 PM – 2.15 PM:      Breakout Session -2: Technology Transfer and Licensing in Translation      Research - NJIT Tech Transfer and Licensing 

Chang Yaramothu, Assistant Professor, School of Applied Engineering & Technology; CEO/CTO, OculoMotor Technologies, Inc.

Shawn Chester, Associate Vice Provost for Research Collaborations

Sherie Dodson, Associate Director for Technology Transfer & Intellectual Property

Sanjiv Chokshi, Esq, Associate General Counsel

·      Post-Provisional Strategies

·       Customer Discovery

·       Licensing vs. Startup

·       Development Plans

·       Commercialization Plans

2.15 PM – 3.00 PM:  Breakout Session 3 – NJII Venture Studio

Michael Van Ter Sluis​​​​, Vice President, Entrepreneurship, NJII

Mary Jane Durkin, Director NJII Entrepreneurship and Venture Studio

·      Overview of NJII’s Venture Studio

·      Investor Readiness

·      Faculty Engagement with Venture Studio

3.00 PM - 3.30 PM:       Closing Remarks

Please register today and encourage your students and postdocs to register. This is a good opportunity for everyone to learn essential steps for successful translational research roadmap to entrepreneurship to bring your innovation from lab to market.  

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Recent NJIT Non-Provisional U.S. Patent Applications (Filed) 

Patent Title:    Interlocking Robotic Assembly System

NJIT Ref No.:   24-012

Inventor(s):      Petras Swissler

Patent Application Status:   Filed Non-Provisional Patent Application

Patent Application Filing Date:  3/17/2025

Application Filing No.:   19/081,161

Technology Licensing Status:  Available 

NSF: Launching Early-Career Academic Pathways in the Mathematical and Physical Sciences

NIH: Investigator Gateway Awards for Collaborative T1D Research (R03) - No new FOA posted

Department of Defense/US Army/DARPA/ONR: Fiscal Year (FY) 2026 Department of Defense Multidisciplinary Research Program of the University Research Initiative (MURI) - No new FOA posted

Department of Energy: 2025 Exploratory Research for Extreme-Scale Science - No new FOA posted

NASA: Several Pending ROSES 2025 RFPs; ROSES 2024: A.52 Advanced Component Technology - No new FOA posted

National Endowment of Humanities: Humanities Initiatives - No new FOA posted

DOD cuts $580M in programs, contracts and grants: The Pentagon is eliminating over $580 million in programs, grants and contracts across the department that it called “wasteful spending,” with a long-stalled software modernization program accounting for almost half of the cuts. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced the spending drawback in a memo released on Thursday, writing that the terminated expenditures were “inconsistent with the priorities of the DOD.” In addition to the topline figure, Hegseth also wrote that the move would result in approximately $170 million in estimated savings which could be reallocated across the department. The most noteworthy termination was a human resources software development program and its associated active contracts. DOD said the initiative was intended to help streamline a significant portion of the department’s legacy HR program but has become bogged down by hefty cost overruns and delays. The program started in 2018 and was expected to be completed in one year at a cost of approximately $36 million. It is now six years behind schedule and the total cost has soared to more than $280 million over its initial estimate. More information is posted on the NextGov website.

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NVIDIA and MITRE announce AI-powered 6G project: NVIDIA and MITRE unveiled a new partnership on Tuesday that will work toward developing wireless networks with artificial intelligence systems to enable them to work alongside 6G connectivity. Also in partnership with T-Mobile, Cisco, ODC, Cerberus Capital Management and Booz Allen Hamilton, NVIDIA and MITRE will be researching how to create wireless networks that are inherently designed to support and leverage AI systems.

“AI-native wireless networks will bring transformative benefits for transportation, healthcare, and more, improving spectrum efficiency and connectivity, enhancing real-time sensing and monitoring, and enabling innovations,” Mark Peters, MITRE president and CEO said in a press release. “Creating 6G to take full advantage of cutting-edge technologies, along with collaboration and partnership with industry, is vital to delivering innovations and efficiencies at a global scale.” Embedding next-generation wireless technology with AI is intended to maximize the performance of wireless networks. NVIDIA will focus on merging its AI Aerial software platform into the software stacks of partner wireless networks to enable them to access more data on their network’s performance, incorporate other AI technologies and more. More information is posted on the NextGov website.