Awards

Biodesign faculty, students, fellows and alumni have received numerous awards since the start of the program.

November, 2009 Driptech, the business started by Peter Frykman, a Biodesign Teaching Assistant in 2007, is featured prominently as one of Businessweek's Most Intriguing New Startups for 2009.

November, 2009 The Jaipur Knee, designed by students in Tom Andriacchi's class as the Biodesign-sponsored project, has been selected as one of Time Magazine's Top 50 Inventions for 2009. Congratulations to the student team: Ayo Roberts, Joel Sadler, Angelo Szychowski, Eric Thorsell and Ellis Garai (2009 Biodesign Fellow).

November, 2009 We congratulate Srinivas Jaggu, a 2008-2010 Stanford-India Biodesign fellow, who was recently chosen as one of the first TEDIndia Fellows for 2009.

November, 2009 Stanford School of Medicine instructor and former Biodesign student, Daniel Kraft, MD, gave a talk at TED MED in February, 2009. Kraft showed off the Marrow Miner, a device he invented to harvest bone marrow and explains how the adult stem cells found in bone marrow can be used to treat many terminal conditions. See the video.

October, 2009 Tom Krummel, the Emile Holman Professor and chair of the Department of Surgery and Co-Director of the Biodesign Program, was recently installed as the President of the Halsted Society for the 2010 Society year. This is one of the oldest and most prestigious surgical organizations in the country whose purpose is to further the scientific principles and ideals; to encourage exchange of ideas, free and informal discussion, and a spirit of sociability and good fellowship among its members.

October, 2009 Scott Delp, PhD, Professor of Bioengineering and of Mechanical Engineering, and, by courtesy, or Orthopaedic Surgery, co-director of the Stanford Center for Biomedical Computation and Advisory Faculty in the Biodesign Program, has been appointed as an initial holder of the James H. Clark Professorship in the School of Engineering. The James H. Clark Fund for Bioengineering was established in 1999 to support bioengineering faculty generally, and was previously used to support new faculty in starting up their labs.

October, 2009 Biodesign has been selected to be the recipient of a $25,000 grant from Edwards Life Sciences.

September, 2009 Long time supporter of Biodesign, Eberhard Grube, has been chosen to receive the first-ever Geoffrey O. Hartzler Master Clinical Operation Award for technical excellence and commitment for his work that has advanced the field of interventional cardiology. The award is given by the Cardiovascualr Resarch Foundation.

September, 2009 Driptech, a low-cost drip irrigation technology started by Peter Frykman (former Biodesign TA), was recently given the 2009 Tech Awards Laureate by the San Jose Tech Museum, recognizing innovative use of technology for the benefit of humanity.  The awards ceremony and gala dinner will be held in November.

July, 2009 The Stanford India Biodesign Fellows 2008 won the first prize in business plan competition – “India Innovation Pioneers Challenge 2009” held at Intel campus, Bangalore. The team comprising Srinivas Kiran Jaggu, Jayant S. Karve and Dr. Sandeep Singh presented a novel device to access circulation in clinical emergencies where IV access fails. The team will get an opportunity to showcase their plan at Intel+UC-Berkeley Technology Entrepreneurship Challenge in Berkeley,CA to be held in November 2009. Department of Science and Technology (DST), Indo-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF) and Intel jointly organized the competition.

July, 2009 An Intern team from Stanford India Biodesign, comprising Shitij Malhotra, Mansi Aggarwal and Pooja Singh,won the first prize at the BEST programme for their concept “Vein Location - Cost effective, non-invasive, easy to use portable device.” This national level programme aimed at encouraging young post-graduate and doctoral students in developing biotechnology entrepreneurship and exposing them to issues involved in commercialization of bio-science culminated in an entrepreneurship workshop at Bangalore from the 25th to 27th July 2009. Mr Shrikumar Suryanarayan, Director General mentored the conduct of the programme. The winning teams will be given an opportunity to present their concepts at BioInvest 2009, the annual summit of Biotech entrepreneurs, professionals and institutional investors, at Mumbai on 5th Nov 2009.

June, 2009 The Re:motion team consisting of Joel Sadler, Eric Thorsell and Ellis Garai won $20,000 at the Stanford Social Entrepreneurship Competition (Social-E Challenge) for the Jaipur-knee. The product is a polymer-based knee joint that can be manufactured for less than $20. The JaipurKnee is in field trials in India and has been fitted on over 150 patients to date. They were recently featured in Businessweek and Fast Company among others.

June, 2009 The Fellows White Team (Greg Magee, Erika Palmer, Jake Brenner and Ruey Peh) has been awarded first prize for HemorX, a medical device company with a better solution for hemorrhoids, in the Boomers Competition hosted by Santa Clara University. The award is $10,000.

June, 2009 Drew Hall, a fourth-year student in electrical engineering, and Richard Gaster, a medical and bioengineering student, were presented with $10,000 at an award ceremony for their handheld diagnostic device. More than 200 students from every continent except Antarctica submitted technological solutions to societal problems, and the entries of the 15 finalists were evaluated by the immediate past, present and future presidents of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. In addition to a monetary reward, in recognition of this achievement, they had a minor planet named for them by the LINEAR Program of MIT Lincoln Laboratory. Their success has been detailed at the Stanford News website.

June, 2009 Lab-on-a-Stick -- Diagnostic technology without a lab wins the BME-Idea award for 2009. A Stanford team has developed a simple, affordable method for diagnosing illnesses with a disposable “stick” pre-treated with assorted protein receptors. Lab-on-a-Stick, when used in conjunction with a portable handheld device, can help medical practitioners identify diseases. This invention will be especially useful in remote areas where access to labs is not always feasible.

June, 2009 Dr. Thomas Krummel, Emile Holman Professor and Chair of the Department of Surgery, Susan B. Ford Surgeon-in-Chief at LPCH, and Professor, by courtesy, of Cardiothoracic Surgery and Co-Director of the Biodesign Program, has received the "Outstanding Achievement in Medicine Award" from the Santa Clara County Medical Association. This award is given to a physician member of the Association who, during his/her medical career, has made unique contributions to the betterment of patient care, for which he/she has achieved widespread recognition.

June, 2009 Stroke Coach, an iphone application, received three awards in the CS 194 class' Software Faire. The application, devised by David Boudreault (Fellow, 2007-2009) and developed by undergraduate students Adam Bernstein, Eric Ellenoff, John Laxson and Aaron Sarnoff, assists patients at risk from stroke in recognizing the symptoms of a true stroke and encourage and enable them to seek treatment. The application won the three awards including the VC award and Best in Show.

June, 2009 Respira, the company started by the students who worked with the Biodesign Mexico fellows in 2007, won first place in the BASES Social EChallenge - they tied with Re:Motion Designs, a company formed by students who created a low-cost prosthetic knee joint, a project sponsored by Biodesign.

May, 2009 The Fellows White Team (Greg Magee, Erika Palmer, Jake Brenner and Ruey Peh) has been awarded first prize for HemorX, a medical device company with a better solution for hemorrhoids, in the E-challenge business plan competition. The prize is $25,000.

May, 2009 Miret Surgical, the company that has been started by Kevin Chao and Avi Roop, has made the finals in the Boomers Competition at Santa Clara University. The final round of judging will take place at Santa Clara University as part of the Silicon Valley Boomer Summit and Business Plan Competition and Summit on June 16-17, 2009.

May, 2009 Sankalp 2009, India’s Largest Social Enterprise and Investment Forum, announced awards for innovative key entrepreneur ideation in the healthcare sector. The Sankalp 2009 Emerging Award for Healthcare was won by Biosense Technologies, an enterprise that is actively focused on combating anaemia-the cause of 40% maternal and infant mortality. Darshan Nayak, 09 SIB Fellow, is the co-founder of Biosense.

April, 2009 The Biodesign White Team (Greg Magee, Erika Palmer, Jake Brenner and Ruey Peh) have been awarded an NCIIA E-Team grant for their project on fecal incontinence.

March, 2009 Matthew Callaghan (2008-09 Fellow) is a member of a team of researchers who have been awarded a Coulter Translational Research Grant. Their project is "A Low Cost Ventilator for Use in Developing Nations and Large Scale Disasters."

March, 2009 The 2008 Stanford-India Biodesign Fellows (Nish Chasmawala, Srinivas Jaggu, Jayant Karve, Amit Sharma and Sandeep Singh) have received two grants to forward their projects. The first is $150K from COSAT, the R&D development branch of Johnson & Johnson. The second is $100K from the Department of Biotechnology in the Indian Government. The funds will be used to forward two of their projects from the fellowship.

March, 2009 The Biodesign Red Team (Joelle Abra, Kevin Chao, Matthew Callaghan, and Avi Roop) for 2008-09 have made the finals of the Rice Business Plan Competition. Their concept is a surgical tool kit that enables standard laparoscopic techniques during cholecystectomy without producing visible scars.

March, 2009 Amir Belson, 2001-02 Fellow has been awarded an Invention Award by Popular Science Magazine (pdf).

February, 2009 Avi Roop, Kevin Chao, Greg Magee and Ronald Jou (2008-09 Fellows) teamed up to become 'Team SkullFX' in order to submit an invention to the 2008 Bike Safety Invention Challenge at Stanford. They took 2nd place in the challenge with their invention of the Halo lighting system.

February, 2009 Dr. Tom Krummel, the Emile Holman Professor and chair of the Department of Surgery, has been selected to receive the 2009 Santa Clara County Medical Association "Outstanding Achievement in Medicine."

February, 2009 Paul Yock, Director of Biodesign, has been elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

January, 2009 Biodesign is used as an example of the right approach to technology translation in the new book "Tapping the Riches of Science: Universities and the Promise of Economic Growth" by Roger Geiger and Creso Sa [Harvard University Press, 2008. 251 pp. ISBN: 978-0-674-03128-9]

November, 2008 Tom Andriacchi's course, Medical Device Design, produced the First Place winner in the The James F. Lincoln Arc Welding Foundation Arc Welding Awards for "An Above-knee Prosthesis Designed for Extreme Affordability." The students on the team were Ayo Roberts, Joel Sadler, Angelo Szychowski, Eric Thorsell.

November, 2008 Tom Krummel, Co-director of Biodesign, has been elected Vice President and President Elect of the Halsted Society.

October, 2008 A Stanford team of students received first prize in the BME-IDEA competition. The team of Ellis Garai, Anup Shah, and Sumona Nag, won with Rapid Suture, a small, inexpensive device that allows for quick, safe, and easy surgical tissue manipulation during laparoscopic procedures. The prize is $10,000. Congratulations!

October, 2008 Thomas Krummel and Paul Wang, faculty in Biodesign, have been awarded grants by NCIIA for the following projects, respectively: "Low Cost Ventilator for Use in Developing Nations and Large Scale Disasters" and "Endurance Rhythm."

August, 2008 The Biodesign Program is highlighted as an innovative educational program in the new book by Judith Estrin, "Closing the Innovation Gap: Reigniting the Spark of Creativity in a Global Economy," McGraw-Hill, 2008. 272 pp. ISBN: 978-0-071-49987-3]

July, 2008 Bilal Shafi, Biodesign fellow 2005-2007, was selected by MIT's technology review as one of the nation's top technology innovators under 35. Read the press release (pdf).

June, 2008 After a spectacular pitch and superior question-answering skills amongst stiff competition (over 60 competitors), the Fellowship WhiteTeam (Jamie van Hoften, Dorothea Koh, Ronald Jou, Brian Fahey and Zachary Edmonds) took home first prize and a $10,000 check at the Boomer Venture Summit with their rehabilitation device.

May, 2008 Stanford Wins $30 Million Federal Grant to Help Turn Research Into Medical Care. A large federal grant recognizing the Stanford University School of Medicine's potential to translate laboratory discoveries into advances in health care has placed the school among a core group of academic medical centers funded to crack this surprisingly hard problem. The grant will support, among other things, two 'technology accelerator' programs, one for medical technology and the other for drugs and diagnostics, that will advise faculty and students on how to develop their inventions and foster partnerships with Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. These programs will build on Stanford's already successful efforts such as the Biodesign Program, which trains students and fellows in medicine, engineering and business to develop biomedical devices, and the SPARK program, which provides a year of funding for promising biomedical projects and mentoring by faculty with company experience.

May, 2008 The Biodesign Innovation Fellowship White team (Jamie van Hoften, Dorothea Koh, Ronald Jou, Brian Fahey and Zachary Edmonds) has won first place in the I-Challenge Final Round for their project based on a clinical need in muscle rehabilitation for long term care patients. The team won $1000.

April, 2008 The Biodesign Innovation Fellowship Red team (David Boudreault, Marie Guion-Johnson, Nandan Lad and Beverly Tang) were awarded an e-team NCIIA grant for $20,000. Their submission is titled "A Novel, Robust Device to Prevent Fetal Death during Labor & Delivery."

April, 2008 The Biodesign Innovation Fellowship Red team (David Boudreault, Marie Guion-Johnson, Nandan Lad and Beverly Tang) submitted a 100 word 'Big Idea' to the Uuni competition. They were selected among the top 75 groups to move onto the second stage - which includes a 1500 word write-up and 1 minute video. They've been awarded a letter of commendation for being a regional winner. If they win the second stage, they head to London, England to present their work. The first prize award is 20,000 pounds.

March, 2008 Team rubber 3 (three Biodesign innovation fellows) attempted the Innovation Challenge for EWeek and came out winning "Biggest Failure." Yes, that was one of the awards. There was a lesson to be learned: See the video!

January, 2008 Dr. Paul Yock, the Martha Meier Weiland Professor in the School of Medicine, Professor of Bioengineering and Director of Biodesign, will be recipient of the American College of Cardiology Foundation's Distinguished Scientist Award "for his development of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) imaging and his other innovative contributions to vascular devices as well as cardiovascular education."

November, 2007 InSite Medical Technologies (San Francisco, CA), an early stage medical device company focused on the safe and accurate delivery of epidural anesthesia, has received an SBIR Phase I Award from the National Science Foundation to support development of its proprietary epidural access technology. The need for innovation in the delivery of regional anesthesia was identified by a team of Fellows (Stephen Eichmann, Zachary Malchano, James Wall, and Kenneth Wu) in the Biodesign Innovation Fellowship Program at Stanford University. The group was awarded a grant in early 2007 from the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance (NCIIA) that allowed the team to develop initial prototypes and perform early proof-of-concept studies.  Wall and Wu are currently leading the effort to develop their technology for clinical use.

October, 2007 StemCor gets FDA approval Congratulations to StemCor Systems, who received FDA approval today for their MarrowMiner (TM) product. Daniel Kraft, founder of StemCor, invented the technology while working with Biodesign.

September, 2007 The 2006 Biodesign team in course ME382 consisting of Melanie Fox (Delp Lab), Chandra Mohan Jha (Kenny lab),  Grant Lee, JinHoon Park, and Gabriel Sanchez (Andriacchi lab)  received the James F. Lincoln Gold Award for their initial design of a new glaucoma preventing implant. The proposed device lowers ocular pressure by draining excess aqueous fluid from the anterior chamber. A microprocessor monitors the eye pressure and holds it at a pre-determined healthy level. In addition, the device could prevent hypotony, or dangerously low eye pressure, which is a side-effect of some currently available implants

September, 2007 LifeScience Alley announced that Paul G. Yock, M.D., director of Stanford University's program in Biodesign, will give the keynote address during the luncheon at the association's annual conference on December 6, 2007.

September, 2007 The 2006-07 Biodesign Innovation Fellows Steve Eichmann, Zach Malchano, James Wall, and Ken Wu were awarded an Advanced E-Team grant from the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance (NCIIIA; http://www.nciia.org) for a project focused on the improved delivery of regional anesthesia.  The Advanced E-Team grant provides funding support to bring innovative ideas to prototypes and potentially to market.  The grant award of $18,500 will be used, in part, to develop advanced prototypes for bench-top and pre-clinical testing.   Milestones for the team include developing a complete business plan and financial model, bench-top and pre-clinical testing, FDA regulatory submission, and fundraising for project commercialization.

September, 2007 Fellows Venita Chandra and Rich Vecchiotti were awarded a NCIIA (National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance) Advanced E-Team grants for our novel stress urinary incontinence device. The NCIIA grant provided teams with financial support to bring an innovative product or technology from idea to prototype, and eventually to market. Successful E-Team grant proposals demonstrate an idea’s technical feasibility, social value, and potential for commercialization. Advanced E-Team grants range in size from $1,000 to $20,000; the grant period is twelve to eighteen months.   They were awarded $16,500. 

August, 2007 Mexico Fellow Santiago Ocejo, is part of team that has reached the finals in the Changemakers Collaborative Competition. The team, which includes Eric Green (SoM), Ocejo, John Hutchison (GSB), Irit Epelbaum (GSB) and Yungmoon Change (SoE), created a paper tube device to help deliver medicine to asthmatic children in rural Mexico. The team has been selected to compete for a $5,000 prize from the non-profit group, Changemakers.

June, 2007 BMEidea Competition Second prize went to the enLight: Enabling Life with Light team from Stanford University. The team is developing a novel treatment for Parkinson's Disease that enables the effective and reliable control of neural activity using light. The device combines gene delivery of a light-sensitive ion channel with an implantable optical stimulator to directly and specifically control the neurons involved in Parkinson's.

June, 2007 Theo Tam, alumni Biodesign student, recently received the CUREs competition first prize with a proposal for a low cost medical device to help diagnose and treat cervical cancer in developing countries. CUREs is a medical device competition sponsored through Duke University's Engineering World Health program where Tam is a graduate student.

June, 2007 The White Team (Venita Chandra, Rich Vecchiotti, Tatum Tarin, Ross Venook, Joel Goldsmith) has been selected as a finalist in the BoomerVentures competition through Santa Clara University. They were selected from 12 semi-finalists to move to the next stage. Winners will be announced June 19. Grand Prize is $10,000.

May, 2007 Dr. Paul Yock was awarded a Doctor of Science (Hon.) from Amherst College where he graduated in the class of 1973. He was one of eight individuals to receive such honors for the 2006-07 academic year.

May, 2007 The Biodesign Innovation Fellows Steve Eichmann, Zach Malchano, James Wall, and Ken Wu are finalists in the Stanford BASES E-Challenge business plan competition for their company focused on improving delivery of regional anesthesia. The Stanford Entrepreneur's Challenge (E-Challenge) is an annual business plan competition conducted by the Business Association of Stanford Engineering Students (BASES) with the purpose of developing the next generation of entrepreneurs. The competition, involving written and presented business plan information, consists of three rounds of judging by local entreprenuers, venture capitalists, and angel investors. Over 113 teams submitted business plans for review, 27 presented during the semi-final round, and 8 teams now remain for the final round of presentations and judging. The team was subsequently invited to participate in the DFJ business plan challenge among the top b-plans from the state of California's b-plan competitions with a potential prize of $250K

April, 2007 A Wound Closure team member from the Biodesign Innovation Course in 2006 and other GSB students (Dr. Milana Trounce, Avishai Shoham, Kristen Gasior and Adam de la Zerda) earned first place for their project: Short Pulsed Laser for Wound Closure at the Women 2.0 awards.

October, 2006 The Cardiovascular Research Foundation (CRF) honored Paul G. Yock, MD, with this year's TCT Career Achievement Award. Yock is the Martha Meier Weiland Professor of Medicine and Director of Biodesign. The award honors Yock's achievements not only as a world-renowned inventor, but also as an outstanding educator and leader.

October, 2006 The Institute for Health Technology Studies (InHealth) has awarded a one-year research grants to Dr. Paul Yock. The project will document the current regulatory and commercialization processes required of new medical technologies.

February, 2006 Dr. Thomas Krummel, the Emile Holman Professor and Chair of the Department of Surgery at SUMC, Susan B. Ford Surgeon-in-Chief at Packard Children’s and Director of the Biodesign Innovation Fellowship for Surgery was elected the Secretary Treasurer of the prestigious Halstead Society. He will serve a 3-year term and then become Vice President, and in 2009-10 he will serve as President.

February, 2006 John Linehan, Consulting Professor of Bioengineering and Executive Editor of bmesource.org, was elected into the National Academy of Engineering, the country’s highest academic distinction for engineers.

February, 2006 Cardiovascular Team has been awarded an e-Team grant from the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovator’s Alliance (NCIIA) for their development of a new catheter-based system for cardiac ablation.

February, 2006 Alex Butterwick, a PhD student in applied physics, Ashish Mitra, a mechanical engineering student, Dr. Martin Ng, an interventional cardiology fellow and John White, an MBA student and Biodesign Innovation Fellow have secured a grant from the NCIIA. The team is developing a novel endovascular fixation technology.

November, 2005 Dan Riskin, former Surgical Innovation Fellow, had been honored in MIT’S Tech Review as one of their Top 35 Innovators under 35.

August, 2005 Six Stanford University students have been named winners of the first Biomedical Engineering Innovation Design Award (BMEidea) competition. The team was awarded $10,000 by the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance (NCIIA) for inventing a novel way to treat cerebral aneurysm—a bulging weak spot on an artery in the brain that, if ruptured, may cause seizures and even death.

July, 2005 This year's Innovation Fellows team received First Runner-Up in the BASES e-challenge for a device concept in the stroke prevention area. The team consisted of Shubhayu Basu, Corinne Bright, Henry Chen and Ken Martin. The team received a prize of $15,000.

October, 2005 Paul Yock, Co-Chair of Bioengineering and Professor of Medicine, Bioengineering and Mechanical Engineering (by courtesy), was recently awarded the 2005 Innovator Award for the Phoenix Hall of Fame for Medical Device and Diagnostic Leadership.

November, 2005 Stanford students swept the James F. Lincoln awards this year. The Stanford Biodesign Innovation Program Team-Buzzy Bonneau, Jeremy Dittmer, Surag Mantri, Ryan McDonell, Tim Ramsey and Tejas Mazmudar for A Device to Prevent Falls in the Elderly received a Silver Award.

February, 2005 The Licensing Foundation of LES awarded the 2005 Edwin A. Shalloway Graduate Student Licensing Competition award to the Biodesign Innovation Fellowship Team.

July, 2004 Biodesign Innovation Fellows Place 2nd in BASES e-challenge. Their invention, a new approach for the treatment of stroke complications, has garnered major attention and appears likely to be developed into a new clinical technology over the next few years.

December, 2003 Beverly Bangayan, Mariel Fabro and Rajan Prakash who won the gold award in the prestigious national Lincoln Design competition for their ME382 project "Interventional Aortic Valve Repair System." This team was sponsored by Biodesign.

December, 2003 The team of Raphael Michel, Elizabeth Dzeng, Fay Xing, and Jessica March from the Biodesign Innovation course received an NCIIA E-Team award for their Med 272 project "Transesophageal Cooling Device."