The Center for Translational Medicine at the University of Montana will help faculty, staff and students commercialize their research

As Inimmune http://www.inimmune.com http://www.matr.net/article-73976.html workers settled into their new partnership
with UM and worked more closely with the University’s
research enterprise, it became clear that many campus
scientists had great ideas but needed assistance moving
them forward. The folks at Inimmune, on the other hand,
had years of experience translating research from the lab
bench to Phase I clinical trials.

So Jay Evans of Inimmune and Scott Whittenburg,
UM’s research vice president, hatched a plan: Use the
teams’ experience as the foundation for a new Center for
Translational Medicine .

The center will help faculty, staff and
students across the Montana University System move their
research ideas from bench to bedside and provide new
medicines for improving the lives of people. The center also
will seek to increase funding at UM through new research
collaborations and licensing. The center will link resources
and expertise across diverse disciplines and departments.
"The people at Inimmune are very interested in helping
others generate startup companies," Whittenburg says.
"They have good connections to major pharmaceutical
companies, so we see a lot of potential for the new center.
It’s all about trying to create more economic development
for our region."

At the end of last year, about 30 UM faculty members
already had started attending center meetings. Most are
from major research units, but some are from sectors such
as computer science, mathematics and business. And
partners from other Montana campuses also are welcome.

Evans says the new center, in conjunction with UM’s
Office of Technology Transfer, can answer a lot of questions:
How do I move an idea or research finding to a clinical
trial to help people? How do I approach a pharmaceutical
company with my idea? How do I patent my idea and then
license it to generate revenue for UM? How do I document
and archive my research correctly to protect my intellectual
property? How do I write a small-business research grant?

Evans says a pitch to a pharmaceutical company
structured like an academic research proposal or
presentation likely is dead on arrival. The new center can
improve proposals with a market analysis, product profile
and information on target populations, medical need,
safety, manufacturing and scalability.

Researchers may apply for external grants using the
center, and a portion of that money from successful
applications will be banked to nurture great ideas among
those who can’t land outside funding. Evans says many
of the best translational research ideas aren’t great basic
academic science that federal funding agencies will support
– such as developing a drug – but the idea may result in
viable licensing revenue or a new biotech company in
Missoula. So the center will help address this funding gap
by providing money for preliminary data that might attract
assistance from an outside company or a small-business
grant.

"The more biotech companies that locate in Montana,
the better it will be for everybody," Evans says. "Because
if one company falls on hard times and those employees
need jobs, then there are other companies to go to. It’s
good to have a cluster where employees can move back
and forth and share ideas."

https://www.umt.edu/urelations/pubs/Vision%20magazine/Vision%202017/Vision%202017.pdf