News - MSU Innovation Center

Bachmann’s pioneering DFMO research leads to FDA-approved lifesaving cancer drug

College of Human Medicine.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved a drug to treat neuroblastoma, an often-fatal pediatric cancer, based on pioneering research by College of Human Medicine professor André Bachmann. The FDA approved a tablet form of a drug called difluoromethylornithine, or DFMO (synonym eflornithine), developed in 1978 and later used to treat West African sleeping …


MSU’s Timothy Grotjohn Inducted as NAI Fellow

Michigan State University’s Timothy Grotjohn, a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, has been elected as a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI) for its 2023 class for his work on diamond process and device research and development. This prestigious recognition honors Grotjohn’s contributions to the field of diamond synthesis …


From Prototype to Purpose: ReelFree’s Mission to Enhance Elderly Care

 East Lansing, MI – When Alexander and Austin Pollock were growing up, their grandfather, a Michigan State alum, took them to Grandparents University. Though they could not have known it then, their grandfather was not only steering them towards attending his alma mater but years later, he became the inspiration for a company they created …


Powering the Future: RedoxBlox’s Renewable Energy Storage Revolution 

East Lansing, MI – To reduce carbon emissions and combat climate change, more companies are moving away from their dependence on fossil fuels and turning to sources of renewable energy. RedoxBlox, a new company founded on technology developed at MSU and now based in San Diego, expands renewable energy sources and strengthens grid stability by …


Micro Technologies, Macro Impact: Wen Li’s Sensor Revolution 

East Lansing, MI – As a Professor with Michigan State University’s (MSU) Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Wen Li’s research interests range from microelectromechanical systems, nanoelectromechanical systems, microsensors, and actuators to biomimetic devices and systems; from microfluidic and lab-on-chip systems to microsystem integration and packaging technologies.    “My team specializes in micro technologies, that is, …


Building Bridges: The Collaborative Composite Revolution at Michigan State University 

East Lansing, MI – For over 25 years, Michigan State University (MSU) has spearheaded research and education in composite materials. These engineered materials combine two or more constituent materials to develop new materials with unique characteristics such as weight reduction, enhanced strength and durability, corrosion resistance, and minimized environmental impact.   Dr. Mahmoodul Haq, Associate Professor …


Revolutionizing Immunity: The Q Beta Breakthrough 

East Lansing, MI – Xuefei Huang’s lifelong research has been focused on building tools to recognize and target carbohydrates. Not the carbohydrates commonly found in our food, clothing, paper, etc., but carbohydrates found on cell surfaces. “Human cells, bacteria surfaces, some virus surfaces; they all have carbohydrates,” says Huang. “What we’re interested in is developing …


Bacterial Alchemy: Transforming Microbes into Nutraceutical Factories 

East Lansing, MI – Björn Hamberger, an associate professor at Michigan State University (MSU) in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, tells the story of a pre-homo sapiens man buried in a cave in Iraq surrounded by many flowering plants. “We know some of these plants today as powerful antimalarials,” says Hamberger. Humans knew …


Changing fitness effects in long-term evolution experiment

College of Natural Science

The latest issue of Science magazine has a long-format research article on the bacterial populations in an experiment started in 1988 by EEB core faculty member Richard Lenski. With a team of researchers from Spain, France, and Harvard, Lenski and colleagues used high-throughput genomic methods to analyze the fitness effects of hundreds of thousands of …



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