Shrink Nanotechnologies, Inc. (“Shrink”) (OTCBB:INKN), an innovative nanotechnology company developing products and licensing opportunities in the solar energy industry, medical diagnostics and sensors and biotechnology research and development tools businesses, announced today that its scientific founder, Dr. Michelle Khine, has received a multi-year and multi-million dollar grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to work on her shrink-film based diagnostic platforms.
In addition to the grant, she was given the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award. The core of the technology underlying this grant is being commercialized by Shrink Nanotechnologies in the form of its NanoShrink branded shrink films, StemDisc cell culturing devices as well as numerous additional products that are under development using this innovative shrink-film based platform. Shrink’s initial suites of products are slated for commercial sale later this year.
As part of NIH's commitment to increasing opportunities for new scientists, it has created the NIH Director's New Innovator Award, which addresses two important goals: stimulating highly innovative research and supporting promising new investigators. The award supports exceptionally creative new investigators who propose highly innovative projects that have the potential for unusually high impact.
The grant to Dr. Khine, $2.295 million over five years, will fund the research and development of “Shrink-Induced Manufacturing Platforms for Low-Cost Diagnostics (SIMPL-CD),” which aims to develop Khine’s existing micro- and nanofabrication technology to create microfluidic devices to detect rotavirus infections from saliva samples in children in developing countries.
Commenting on this announcement, Mark L. Baum, Shrink’s Founder and CEO stated, “NIH’s recognition of the intelligence, creativity and promise behind Dr. Khine’s work, along with MIT’s Technology Review Magazine’s TR 35 Award which Dr. Khine received last year, is more important recognition of Dr. Khine’s important work and the platform that we are working on commercializing. It is also another step forward in the growing momentum behind working with low cost, flexible and simple design platforms such as our NanoShrink platform, which was designed by and which is utilized in Dr. Khine's lab. This award will go a long way towards fueling new innovation based on the NanoShrink platform and towards making Dr. Khine’s goal of building and commercializing low cost and flexible diagnostic tools, which have specific application for diseases that typically affect young and poor children, a reality.”
Source: http://www.shrinknano.com/