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Drexel receives $10 million grant from Coulter Foundation for biomedical engineering translational research

Drexel University has been chosen to receive a $10 million endowment grant from the Wallace H. Coulter Foundation to support translational research in biomedical engineering. The grant will fund research designed to shorten the time it takes to move promising innovations from the laboratory into commercialization and clinical practice, bringing life-saving solutions to patients.

With Drexel’s match of the Coulter Foundation’s grant, as well as a significant gift from a generous donor, the university has now established an endowment of more than $20 million to support translational research, which will help make Philadelphia a national hotbed of medical-device development and advance development of a global network of collaboration between universities and the commercial sector. The endowment places Drexel among an elite group of universities at the leading edge of biomedical innovations.

Drexel’s partnership with the Coulter Foundation began in 2006 through the School of Biomedical Engineering, Science and Health Systems and the College of Medicine. The School’s commitment to outcome-oriented translational research to develop biomedical products and technologies in cooperation with clinical and industrial partners in the region and the world aligned with the mission of the Coulter Foundation.

Through what came to be known as the “Coulter Process,” the Foundation helped transform Drexel’s culture through new ways of working together.

The Foundation provided support for the development of several new medical technologies that have since been licensed, including a wound monitor that could help diabetes-associated wounds heal faster and a non-invasive, radiation-free, portable breast cancer screening device. Since the start of the partnership, 21 projects have received funding and have produced more than 40 full patent applications, three issued patents and one copyright registration. Commercialization funds from the Ben Franklin Technology Partners/SEP, Innovation Grants from Pennsylvania’s Department of Community and Economic Development, and the QED Proof-of-Concept Program of the University City Science Center supplemented and extended the Coulter grant.

An additional $18 million in follow-on funding led to seven licenses to industry.

Drexel President John A. Fry attributes these successes to the commitment of exceptional faculty, outstanding students, and clinical and commercialization partners “who work diligently every day to move life-saving discoveries from the bench to the bedside as quickly as possible.”