Background: Boston From Across The Charles River

Archive

Fraunhofer Center for Manufacturing Innovation

Stack of Newspapers
© MEV.

Conferences & Trade Shows 2011-2015

  • AACC Conference: Emerging Clinical & Laboratory Diagnostics

    Nov 4-5, 2015 • Los Angeles, CA

    Fraunhofer CMI scientists Dr. Alexis Sauer-Budge and Dr. Anna Boardman present their latest research on "Rapid Phenotypic Methods for Diagnosing Infections and Antibiotic Susceptibility Testing", and on "Strain specific identification of bacteremic organisms in whole blood: from sample to answer within 7 hrs".

  • 2012 BIO International Convention

    Come visit us at the 2012 BIO International Convention taking place June 18-21, 2012 at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center. We will be located in Booth 0513 of the Germany Pavilion with other Fraunhofer Centers and Institutes.

Historical Press Releases

  • Periodontal Project Picked for Development by Major Manufacturing Center: Center Sees Medical Need and Marketing Potential

    June 11, 2012 • Boston University | Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine

    Preview Image of Spotlight Project

    The Fraunhofer Center for Manufacturing Innovation has selected Drs. Robert Gyurko and Serge Dibart's idea for a novel piezoelectric knife design and implant to accommodate narrow ridges as one of two research projects to support this year. This is the first time the Center, which collaborates with BU, BMC, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and Children's Hospital Boston, chose a research project from the Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine (GSDM).

    The BU–Fraunhofer Alliance for Medical Devices, Instrumentation and Diagnostics expedites the time necessary for new technologies to get from research to patient use. The Center employs full-time engineers and applied scientists who turn design concepts into medical instruments and devices. The finished designs attract venture funding, potential licensors, and government funding.

    The GSDM team proposed a flat implant system, using flat piezoelectric knives (miniature bone saws vibrating at ultrasonic frequencies and sub-millimeter amplitudes) and flat titanium implants.

    “This piezoelectric knife can create various shapes of non-round bone cuts, as opposed to current implant drills that only make cylindrical holes,” said Dr. Gyurko. “The flat profile implant would address the need of patients with narrow residual jawbone without compromising implant stability and longevity.”

    In March 2012, Drs. Gyurko and Dibart responded to a Boston University Medical Campus request for proposals “with high potential clinical impact that are ready to move out of the basic research laboratory.” Gyurko and Dibart were invited to present a full proposal to The Alliance Advisory Board showing the medical need for and potential impact of the design. The group is now in talks about prototype development.

    “This is a wonderful accomplishment and one that Dr. Dibart and his team should feel very proud of achieving,” said Dean Jeffrey W. Hutter. “In addition, the project will bring well-deserved recognition to research at the Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine.”

    SOURCE:
    Periodontal Project Picked for Development by Major Manufacturing Center

    Back to top

  • Fraunhofer Center for Manufacturing Innovation receives National Institutes of Health grant

    August, 2010 • Fraunhofer USA

    BROOKLINE, Massachusetts – Fraunhofer CMI received a R21 exploratory research grant from the National Institutes for Health (NIH), National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) for investigating a new method of detecting antibiotic susceptibility in bacteria.

    Globally, antibiotic resistance is a very serious problem. When a person becomes ill and goes to a physician for treatment, the doctor takes a clinical history, does a physical exam, and, if s(he) suspects a bacterial infection, will take a specimen to send for culture. For most bacteria, it takes 3 to 5 days to determine bacteria identity and its drug susceptibility as the standard methods are based on culture methods and therefore require time to allow the bacteria to grow. In many cases, physicians cannot wait for culture results to administer treatment and so they use their clinical judgment and prescribe treatment in the absence of this information. Some of the time, the wrong antibiotic is prescribed and these events contribute to the rising problem of antibiotic resistance.

    What is needed is a faster diagnostic to enable physicians to prescribe appropriate antibiotic therapy in the first place. That's where Fraunhofer CMI is developing cutting-edge new methods. Dr. Alexis Sauer-Budge considered the problem of detecting antibiotic susceptibility in bacteria. The current practice (culture) requires that the bacteria grow to a high concentration. In the case of tuberculosis, which is an infectious disease that usually attacks the lungs, diagnostics can take as long as six weeks. One rapid diagnostic method with a shorter time to results is Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR). PCR is a genetic test that looks for specific mutations that confer resistance to antibiotics. However, bacteria can develop resistance in many ways (and thus various mutations can confer resistance). Unfortunately, PCR is limited by how many mutations can be interrogated at once and that the genetic basis of the mutation is known ahead of time. Dr. Sauer-Budge came up with a micro-fluidic based method to interrogate the bacteria in a phenotypical method (the visible characteristics of an organism resulting from the interaction between its genetic makeup and the environment). Her method can detect susceptibility in the lab, in 10 minutes. This is a significant improvement over the current practice which takes 3 to 5 days. Moreover, since the method is a phenotypical method, it is robust to genetic mutations conferring new types of resistance and does not require a priori knowledge of the genotype.

    CMI is focusing on one bacteria, Staphylococcus aureus, which causes skin and blood infections. Methicillin-Resistant S. Aureus (MRSA) is a significant contributor to nosocomial infections. The NIH grant is funding Fraunhofer CMI to develop the method further by studying different strains of the bacteria and to standardize the protocol so that their susceptibility can be rapidly determined. Dr. Sauer-Budge created a microfluidic chamber in which the bacteria can be observed in a custom instrument based on a fluorescent microscope. Her image analysis can determine whether or not the bacteria will die in the presence of antibiotics in just 10 minutes.

    The results of her research will help doctors around the world to provide their patients with the correct antibiotic for the initial antimicrobial drug therapy. No more guessing.

    Fraunhofer CMI is partnered with Boston University and is one of six Fraunhofer USA research centers.

    Back to top