The Dutch Research Council (NWO) has awarded funding to five researchers from the University of Twente. They receive this funding for their Demonstrator and Take-off projects. This will allow researchers to further develop their results into a commercial product, carry out a feasibility study into the commercialization of their innovation, or enter the market as a start-up.
Demonstrator and Take-off
NWO has various valorisation instruments. Via Demonstrator, researchers can further develop their results to make them attractive to the market. In addition, NWO offers academic and innovative starters the Take-off funding instrument, aimed at stimulating and supporting scientific activity and entrepreneurship.
In total, the NWO has awarded funding to 8 Demonstrator and 43 Take-off projects. The Demonstrator projects together receive almost 1.3 million euros. Within this round of Take-off, a total of over 3.8 million euros has been distributed among the projects.
Awarded Demonstrator projects
dr. ing. Mieke Luiten-Olieman – ‘Ceramic atomic layer deposited Nanofiltration membranes for separation of challenging industrial streams (CALMEM)’
Faculty of TNW – Inorganic Membranes group
In a recent NWO-TTW project, a new technology has been developed to produce ceramic nanofiltration membranes. The focus of Mieke Luiten-Olieman's project is to demonstrate to large companies the world-class performance of these novel membranes by building a prototype and performing separation experiments with model mixtures from Industry. These new membranes are more environmentally friendly, have lower energy consumption, and will decrease the company's CO2 footprint.
prof. dr. ir. Ivo Vellekoop – ‘X-VIEW: Extreme field of view microscopy’
Faculty of TNW – Biomedical Photonic Imaging group
The design of the microscope is barely changing, which causes a bottleneck for many applications in neuroscience, medicine, developmental biology, and other life sciences. Ivo Vellekoop's project focusses on X-VIEW, a technology that does away with the limitations and design trade-offs of the microscope objective, enabling high-resolution microscopy with an extremely large field of view and solving the throughput problem in a scalable, future-proof way.
Granted Take-off projects
Phase 1
Christoff Heunis MSc – ‘Mobile Magnetic Actuation for Surgical Interventions’
Faculty of ET – Biomechanical Engineering group
In Christoff Heunis’ project, a study will be done on the technical and commercial feasibility of a magnetic actuation system designed to assist surgeons in hospitals. To alleviate specific challenges that surgeons face under pressure in the operating room, it has become crucial to consider the potential role of flexible and safe robotic-assisted surgeries. The goal of this project is to provide a highly flexible, tele-operative, and relaxed working environment for clinicians through the integration of risk-free imaging modalities and magnetic theory with robotic arms.
dr. Vincent Groenhuis – ’Encoder Motor’
Faculty of EEMCS – Robotics and Mechatronics group
In the project of Vincent Groenhuis, an “Encoder Motor” is presented, which is an electric motor with a virtual position sensor. This allows all kinds of devices, including robots and 3D printers, to accurately steer their axes to the desired positions. Because no physical sensor parts are required, considerable savings are made in space, complexity and cost, while the robustness and other properties are significantly better than with conventional engines. The engine is commercially interesting if it can be placed in the market in the right way, which is the main goal of this Groenhuis’ project.
Phase 2
Machnet Medical Robotics (UT Spin-off) – ‘MRI-guided breast biopsy robot’
Machnet focuses on developing a robot for MRI-guided biopsies. The application is primarily focused on taking biopsies of early-stage breast cancer. With this MRI compatible robot technology, the radiologist will be able to position a biopsy or treatment needle in a very accurate way.