Education technology, or ed-tech, is getting big in Baltimore and local experts think Maryland has a shot at being a leader in this technology niche.

But it won’t happen overnight.

“I think we have a unique opportunity to build an ecosystem,” said Frank Bonsal III, an ed-tech venture capitalist who leads Towson University’s business incubator. “An ecosystem takes 20 years to build. We’re on year three.”

Image: Jaclyn Borowski - Andrew Coy, executive director of the Digital Harbor Foundation, says students should play a bigger role in growing ed-tech. 

When it comes to raising capital for a tech startup, savvy entrepreneurs know how important it is to hustle. From trying to attract the attention of VCs to appearing on television shows like ABC’s Shark Tank, these days when it comes to raising cash, everyone is out to get their share.

However, you may be surprised to learn that in this high-tech world, one very traditional institution is looking for smart entrepreneurs to give money to. Aspiring entrepreneur, meet the Small Business Administration (SBA).

With plans to couple Johns Hopkins Medicine’s research cachet and Kaiser Permanente’s population health prowess, the two health giants announced a new “strategic collaboration” on Tuesday.

Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States and Hopkins officials say they will collaborate on patient care by sharing data from electronic medical records and developing better health care models based on evidence of what's worked best. Kaiser will work closely with Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, which is part of the Johns Hopkins network.

Image: http://m.bizjournals.com 

A $10.7 million grant to the University of Maryland School of Dentistry and the University of Maryland School of Medicine will fund the collaborative study of biomarkers associated with sexually transmitted diseases such as chlamydia, in hopes of finding new ways to predict the infection and developing new vaccines or treatments. The five-year grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases is the renewal of a previous $12 million, five-year grant awarded in 2009, bringing the project's total to $22.7 million.

Image: http://www.oea.umaryland.edu 

What do you need to turn a brilliant idea into a business? “A good morale boost,” says Abhishek Motayed, Founder and President of N5 Sensors, Inc. of Rockville. Motayed had that boost this month when N5 Sensors received two Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) awards totaling $250,000. The grants came from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) towards N5 Sensors work developing low-power, computer chip-size benzene, carbon monoxide, and ammonia sensors.

Image: http://umdtechtransfer.wordpress.com - Pasquale Ferrari, Ratan Debnath, Abhishek Motayed 

Maryland Health Secretary Dr. Joshua Sharfstein will step down in January to join Johns Hopkins University.

Sharfstein's move comes as Maryland is trying to revamp its failed health exchange in time for November open enrollment and as Gov. Martin O'Malley's administration winds down.

Image: Nicholas Griner Maryland Health Secretary Dr. Joshua Sharfstein is stepping down in January and will join Johns Hopkins University. 

The Montgomery County Council gave final approval Tuesday to an ambitious land-use plan designed to spur creation of a new science-focused town center in the county’s long-neglected eastern sector.

The White Oak Science Gateway Master Plan envisions housing, retail and a hub for medical and life-sciences research adjacent to the Food and Drug Administration headquarters at Route 29 and Industrial Parkway. The plan also adjusts zoning and land-use regulations with the goal of energizing new residential construction and commercial renewal in the White Oak and Hillandale communities.

The FLC planner visually communicates the outstanding research and development efforts of the federal laboratory system. Images and captions tell the story of the technology's scientific relevance and potential impact.

Printed annually, the planner is distributed to over 10,000 recipients, including members of Congress, scientists, researchers, agency representatives, laboratory directors, technology transfer professionals, students, academia, and members of industry.

Image: http://www.federallabs.org 

QIAGEN (NASDAQ: QGEN; Frankfurt, Prime Standard: QIA) today announced a collaboration agreement with AstraZeneca PLC (LSE, NYSE and OMX: AZN) for the co-development and commercialization of a liquid biopsy-based companion diagnostic to be paired with IRESSA, AstraZeneca's targeted therapy for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The project builds on a master framework agreement signed by both companies in 2013 and aims to develop and market a novel QIAGEN companion diagnostic that analyzes plasma samples to assess EGFR mutation status in NSCLC patients. The assay will be designed to guide the treatment of NSCLC patients with Astra Zeneca's oral monotherapy anti-cancer treatment when tumour tissue is not available. QIAGEN already offers the therascreen EGFR RGQ PCR Kit (therascreen EGFR test) as a tissue-based companion diagnostic for lung cancer patients, which was approved in the U.S. by the FDA in July 2013 and in China in May 2014.

Baltimore startup Quantified Care thinks it's possible for doctors to do an entire check-up with a smartphone and a bag of gadgets. It wants to sell you all of it — including the bag. Quantified Care is making a business of finding the most useful smartphone apps and devices for doctors and is developing software to help docs analyze data across devices. The company also runs an e-commerce website at which doctors can buy the devices it backs.

Image Courtesy of phanlop88 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Ditching handshakes in favor of more informal fist bumps could help cut down on the spread of bacteria and illnesses, according to a study released on Monday.

The study in the American Journal of Infection Control found that fist bumps, where two people briefly press the top of their closed fists together, transferred about 90 percent less bacteria than handshakes.

Image: By The U.S. Army (Fist bump) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons 

In these times of tight budgets and rapidly evolving science, we must consider new ways to invest biomedical research dollars to achieve maximum impact—to turn scientific discoveries into better health as swiftly as possible. We do this by thinking strategically about the areas of research that we support, as well as the process by which we fund that research.

Millions of people make a living without ever setting foot in an office. Particularly in technology, companies are moving away from just outsourcing rote tasks to remote workers and toward building entirely distributed teams. One leader is Elance-oDesk, the largest online marketplace for freelance talent. In addition to providing a platform for distributed and part-time work, the company practices what it preaches. Telecommuting in the United States increased by as much as 79% (paywall) between 2005 and 2012.

We all struggle for a moment of insight. Whether you’ve been banging your head against the wall for days or just woke up to a problem this morning, the desire for a creative boost is a powerful one. It’s the same feeling that plagues writers facing a blank page or advertisers developing a brand’s next campaign—and learning how to achieve it can have a profound impact. Here are some tips to avoid your next headache or create something the world has never seen before:

The Global Innovation Index (GII) report, jointly produced by Cornell University, Insead and Wipo every year, has become a leading source of reference on innovation.

The theme of GII 2014, released on the 18th of July, is ‘Human factor in innovation’. The report covers 143 economies around the world and ranks them on a score of 0-100, using 81 different indicators to gauge innovation capabilities and results. Consistent with the rankings of the past GII reports, the top ten economies in the global innovation index 2014 are Switzerland, UK, Sweden, Finland, Netherland, USA, Singapore, Denmark, Luxemburg and Hong Kong (China), all high income countries, hence pointing towards a clear income-innovation link.

In 1957, eight entrepreneurs decided to do something that seemed crazy. They launched a new tech company called Fairchild Semiconductor in a small town south of San Francisco. The entrepreneurs had a difficult start, but Fairchild eventually became the first major computer chip company in the region.

Montgomery County plans to launch a major technology initiative in its public schools in August, providing 40,000 laptops and tablets to students as part of a project that will expand quickly in coming years, officials said Thursday.

It helps to have a friend. And for several pharma giants scrambling to cut R&D costs, those friends are venture capital firms that co-invest in startups whose new drugs and platform technologies appear attractive. In some cases, these pharma-venture “alliances” launch the startups, using the expertise of VC firm partners and company executives.

Infectious diseases, pathogens and bioterrorism agents are all inside a new building downtown. Jessica Kartalija explains it’s great news for researchers at Johns Hopkins. It’s the newest addition to the Baltimore Science and Technology Park at Johns Hopkins. Inside, it’s a state-of-the-art lab that will keep Maryland on the cutting edge of public health and technology.

Founders Fund already stands out for backing startups with radical ideas, including Counsyl, Hampton Creek, Planet Labs, and SpaceX. Now the venture firm is making a formal commitment to funding startups in aeronautics, life sciences, nanotechnology, and other geeky realms. Founders Fund has dedicated a small percentage of its new $1 billion fund to a new initiative called FF Science, through which the firm will make seed-stage deals.

Kaiser is well known healthcare delivery model and outcomes, but, it turns out, it’s also among the best at engaging members via the web and mobile apps. The organization says in its 2013 annual report (just released) that about 4.4 million of its 9.1 million members use its online health management platform My Health Manager.

While considerable attention has been heaped on the public health insurance exchanges over the year, private health insurance exchanges “are experiencing hyper-growth” and enrollment could exceed that of public exchanges by 2017, “if not sooner,” according to Accenture.

Qiagen has acquired an exclusive global license from the University of Tokyo for the biomarker SF3B1. The company said it sees potential for developing companion diagnostics to guide myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) treatment with new anticancer compounds under development that target the SF3B1 gene.

The Intellectual Property Owners (IPO) recently published a list of the top 100 universities worldwide granted U.S. patents in 2013, and among them were three local schools: Johns Hopkins University, the University of Maryland and the University of Virginia.

Inside sources reveal that Indian pharmaceutical generics firm Lupin, along with other U.S. pharma firms, is considering bidding for GlaxoSmithKline’s auctioned mature and generic drugs.

GSK seeks to divest its lineup of mature drugs in an effort to improve its growth profile by getting rid of its off-patent drugs in North America and Western Europe. The drugs are estimated to bring in annual sales of 1 billion pounds and are expected to fetch two to three times the price on the auction block.

The startup world will perk up to hear that RockthePost and CoFoundersLab recently merged to form Onevest. Together the two companies will provide a single source for startup founders to not only find investors but also find the right co-founders all online.

Jennifer Hammaker has watched biotech company respEQ Inc. grow from an experiment in a Johns Hopkins lab to a fledgling startup now looking for investors.

RespEQ is a prime example of what Hammaker, who leads the Maryland Innovation Initiative, hopes the state's research commercialization program will produce more of in the future.

Apollo Hospitals today announced a partnership with Strand Life Sciences to launch the latter’s genomic tests across its hospitals.

The partnership in gene-based diagnostics with the Bangalore-based healthcare research company will help doctors at Apollo to develop personalised medicine for targeted treatments and better patient outcomes.

GSK has submitted an application for the world’s first malaria vaccine to the European Medicines Agency (EMA).

The vaccine candidate, RTS,S, is produced in yeast cells and targets the Plasmodium falciparum malaria parasite, most common in sub-Saharan Africa. It uses GSK’s proprietary AS01 adjuvant system, containing QS-21 Stimulon adjuvant licensed from Antigenics, a subsidiary of Agenus, as well as monophosphoryl lipid A (MPL) and liposomes.

After decades as a technological laggard, medicine has entered its data age. Mobile technologies, sensors, genome sequencing, and advances in analytic software now make it possible to capture vast amounts of information about our individual makeup and the environment around us. The sum of this information could transform medicine, turning a field aimed at treating the average patient into one that’s customized to each person while shifting more control and responsibility from doctors to patients.

The question is: can big data make health care better?

The implications of the world’s largest collaborative biological project in the year 2000—the Human Genome Project-combined with the Big Data revolution in the medical sciences holds out tremendous promise for human health. Recognizing the imminent need for the next generation of bioinformatics and genomics tools, four academic entrepreneurs from the prestigious Indian Institute of Science co-founded Strand Genomics Inc. (Strand). “Our focus is on personalized clinical genomics and molecular diagnostics. To address the grand challenge of the “$1000 genome and million dollar interpretation”, we have developed a clinical genomics interpretation and reporting platform, StrandOmics,” says Vijay Chandru, Ph.D, Co-founder, Chairman and CEO, Strand.

NextNav LLC, the bicoastal location services venture launched by XM Satellite Radio founder Gary Parsons, announced on Thursday a $70 million Series D funding led by New Enterprise Associates and Oak Investment Partners.

The eight-figure round is the latest high-dollar financing for NextNav, which two years ago reported a $50 million raise from Columbia Capital. Columbia also joined in the most recent round, alongside Telcom Ventures and Goldman Sachs Investment Partners.

Funding and Research Opportunities

The following funding opportunity announcements from the NHLBI or other components of the National Institutes of Health, might be of interest:

NIH Guide Notice: 

• Request for Information: Shared Instrumentation Grant Program (S10) 
  (NOT-OD-14-104) Division of Program Coordination, Planning and Strategic Initiatives, Office of Research Infrastructure Programs
• Extramural Loan Repayment Program for Clinical Researchers (LRP-CR)
  (NOT-OD-14-105) National Institutes of Health
• Extramural Clinical Research Loan Repayment Program for Clinical Researchers from Disadvantaged Backgrounds (LRP-IDB)
  (NOT-OD-14-106) National Institutes of Health
• Extramural Loan Repayment Program for Pediatric Research (LRP-PR)
  (NOT-OD-14-107) National Institutes of Health
• Extramural Loan Repayment Program for Contraception and Infertility Research (LRP-CIR)
  (NOT-OD-14-108) National Institutes of Health
• Extramural Loan Repayment Program for Health Disparities Research (LRP-HDR)
  (NOT-OD-14-109) National Institutes of Health
• Notice of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD) Participation in PA-14-114 "Behavioral Interventions to Address Multiple Chronic Health Conditions in Primary Care (R01)"
  (NOT-DC-14-003) National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders
• Notice of Change to the Award Budget and Submission Requirements for PAR-12-198 "Improving Diet and Physical Activity Assessment (R01)"
  (NOT-DK-14-023) National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases
• Notice of NICHDs Participation in PAR-13-055 "Dissemination and Implementation Research in Health (R01)" 
  (NOT-HD-14-017) Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
• Request for Information: NHLBI Whole Genome Sequencing Project (NHLBI-WGS)
  (NOT-HL-14-030) National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
• Notice of the Change in the Expiration Date for PA-11-347 "NINDS SBIR Technology Transfer (SBIR-TT [R43/R44])"
  (NOT-NS-14-038) National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke

Please note that most links to RFAs, PAs, and Guide Notices will take you to the NIH Web site. RFPs will take you to FedBizOpps. Links to RFPs will not work past their proposal receipt date. Archived versions of RFPs posted on FedBizOpps can be found on the FedBizOpps site using the FedBizOpps search function. Under “Document to Search,” select Archived Documents.

Maryland companies raised $64 million in venture capital funding this spring, with some of the biggest payouts flowing to Baltimore cybersecurity startups.

That's according to the latest MoneyTree report from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association. The report, which uses Thomson Reuters data, tracks money flowing to startups and later-stage firms across the country.

Former state economic development secretary Aris Melissaratos is leaving Johns Hopkins University for a job where he’ll have more power.

Melissaratos, who had been with Hopkins for seven years, on July 17 joined Stevenson University as interim dean of the Brown School of Business and Leadership. Melissaratos said he has always had an interest in academia and now will be able to play a leading role in preparing students to join the local workforce.