Descrizione del progetto
Automatizzare lo smistamento delle uova di pesce per ottimizzare l’innovazione biomedica
Piccolo pesce tropicale della famiglia dei Ciprinidi, il pesce zebra ha avuto un grande impatto sulla ricerca biomedica. Questo esemplare contiene quasi tutti i geni umani e produce centinaia di figli ogni settimana. Le uova restano trasparenti nella fase larvale iniziale, rendendo possibile un’osservazione microscopica non invasiva. Il rapido sviluppo implica che le ipotesi possano essere verificate in tempi minimi. In netto contrasto con la facilità e la velocità con cui vengono prodotte e coltivate le uova, lo smistamento manuale e l’ispezione di migliaia di uova al giorno ha rappresentato un grave collo di bottiglia. EggSorter sta sviluppando un piano di marketing e commercializzazione per un sistema automatizzato che renda tutto ciò più veloce, facile e fruttuoso per agevolare la scoperta e l’innovazione in numerosi settori.
Obiettivo
This project aims at bringing to the market a device that combines innovative micro-engineering design and machine learning methods to automatically inspect and sort miniature biological entities, in particular the egg of zebrafish Danio rerio, which is a common model for studies in genetics, development biology or toxicology. This EggSorter device will have a direct impact in research groups at universities and in the industry that are intensively using such organism in their studies, and that have to invest a large amount of resources for tedious tasks such as the manual sorting of thousands of egg cells every day, or the continuous inspection of these organisms for several hours or days. During this project, we will collaborate with end-users to estimate the technology readiness level of the device for the identified markets, using prototypes that were developed during the recently finished FET ASSISIbf project. In conjunction with the assessment of this technology, we will create a business plan that will include a study of the market opportunities and possible strategies for industrialization and commercialization of the device. Finally, we will create a roadmap for the initialization of a spin-off, which goal will be to bring to the market a product that will not only simplify the work of hundreds of researchers around the world, but also allow to identify novel features related to the development of embryo inside egg cells and new drug discoveries, which will have a high impact on the society in the future.
Campo scientifico
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicinepharmacology and pharmacydrug discovery
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesgenetics
- medical and health sciencesclinical medicineembryology
- natural sciencescomputer and information sciencesartificial intelligencemachine learning
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicinetoxicology
Programma(i)
Argomento(i)
Invito a presentare proposte
Vedi altri progetti per questo bandoBando secondario
H2020-FETOPEN-2018-2019-2020-03
Meccanismo di finanziamento
CSA - Coordination and support actionCoordinatore
1015 Lausanne
Svizzera