July 22, 2004
UW, Washington Technology Center team up for research
From computers to cancer treatment, wheelchairs to semiconductors, six Washington companies have teamed with researchers from the UW to conduct critical research as a result of funding awards from the Washington Technology Center.
The center’s Research & Technology Development (RTD) program awards more than $1 million annually to University researchers working with emerging technology companies on projects that show potential for commercial success.
- Supercomputer talk: Cray, Inc. in Seattle is teamed with Lawrence Snyder of UW’s Computer Science and Engineering Department to compare the UW’s supercomputer language, “ZPL,” to Cray’s supercomputer language “Chapel” with the goal of creating one parallel language that builds off the strongest assets of each program. The research project will test this collaborative new language on Cray’s next generation supercomputers. Both software programs are open source and will be used to accelerate the adoption and sale of supercomputers.
- Improving interfaces: Impulse Accelerated Technologies in Seattle is working with Carl Ebeling from the UW’s computer science and engineering department to develop applications and hardware-software interfaces for a new set of design tools. These tools allow applications written in a high-level language to be compiled into a combination of software and hardware in the form of field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). The commercial availability of these tools will enable designers to quickly and easily take advantage of hardware performance for applications used in imaging, biomedical research, data communication, geophysics, data encryption, and signal processing.
- Cancer-fighting seeds: IsoRay of Richland, Wash., is collaborating with Leroy Korb and the UW’s radiation oncology department to document the anticipated clinical and economic benefits of the company’s new brachytherapy seed isotope — a small radioactive seed implanted to battle cancer cells — for the treatment of prostate cancer. The project will help the company to gain a stronger foothold in the global brachytherapy seed treatment market.
- Safer gas: Lygan Technologies of Seattle is teamed with Guozhong Cao of the UW department of materials science and engineering, to develop carbon-based nanostructures for use in industrial gas storage systems. These systems have the near-term potential to improve the safety, usability and cost-effectiveness of storing such gases as nitrogen and methane. A longer-term goal would be to apply this technology to hydrogen, a desirable power source currently limited in use due to inability to effectively store this gas.
- Better wheels: Magic Wheels Inc. of Seattle is teaming with Brian Flinn from UW’s material science and engineering department in a project to continue testing the endurance, reliability and environmental resistance of the company’s new two-speed manual wheelchair wheels. This two-speed drive contains composite wheels and provides multiple benefits to the manual wheelchair user, including easier navigation on uneven terrain and possible reduction of arm pain.
- Tiny transistors: MicroConnex of Snoqualmie, Wash., is teamed with Scott Dunham at the UW department of electrical engineering to test the feasibility of a new process for manufacturing large arrays of high-performance thin film transistors on flexible silicon-based wafer-style substrates. This new process has the potential to advance the production of thin, flexible semiconductor devices for use in high-performance, high-frequency applications such as radar, telecommunications and signal processing.
The center gives grants in two phases. Phase One grants total up to $40,000, and Phase Two grants, which take projects further toward manufacturing, total up to $100,000. Of these companies, only IsoRay and Magic Wheels are in Phase Two.
Proposals for these awards were evaluated on the basis of technical merit, economic impact and commercial viability. The grants are designed to help the companies advance research and development efforts that will enable them to enter or advance in the commercial marketplace and ultimately generate new technology jobs in Washington.
RTD grants are awarded twice annually, in fall and spring. Grant recipients represent businesses across Washington.
