Technology Research

Offshore wind is an enormous potential energy resource for the United States, with strong, consistent winds located in the Atlantic, Pacific, the Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico. America’s offshore wind resources are estimated at more than 4,000 gigawatts. Energy Secretary Steven Chu has announced $180 Mln funding available for an ambitious project to capture the potential of wind energy off American coasts. As part of a planned six-year $180 million initiative, an initial $20 million will be available this year as the first step in supporting up to four innovative offshore wind energy installations across the United States. Energy Department funds may be used to cover up to 80 percent of a project’s design costs and 50 percent of the hardware and installation costs.

UtiliData, Inc., a developer of voltage optimization products for the electric grid, has completed a round of financing led by Braemar Energy Ventures. UtiliData has developed an approach which utilizes advanced signal processing techniques to control and optimize various devices on the distribution grid, which results in a low cost way to reduce power consumption and extend the life of equipment. The company’s proprietary technology uses advanced signal processing to extract the underlying behavior of the electric distribution grid and uses that information to make near-optimal control decisions of power regulation devices. By reducing line losses and delivering optimal voltage levels to all customers, the system can reduce energy usage and peak demand by up to 5%, as well as optimizing control operations, improving reliability and reducing maintenance costs.

The Obama Administration makes an additional $50 million available for cutting-edge Alzheimer’s research. TheFiscal Year 2013 budget will boost funding for Alzheimer’s research by $80 million as well as an additional $26 million in caregiver support, provider education, public awareness and improvements in data infrastructure. Together, the fiscal years 2012 and 2013 investments total $130 million in new Alzheimer’s research funding over two years – over 25 percent more than the current annual Alzheimer’s research investment.

As many as 5.1 million Americans currently suffer from Alzheimer’s disease, which is a progressive, irreversible brain disorder that destroys memory and thinking skills. With the aging of the U.S. population, the number of people with Alzheimer’s disease could more than double by 2050.

The additional NIH research funding will support both basic and clinical research. Investments will include research to identify genes that increase the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and testing therapies in individuals at the highest risk for the disease. On the clinical side, the funds may be used to expand efforts to move new therapeutic approaches into clinical trials and to develop better databases to assess the nation’s burden of cognitive impairment and dementia.

GlySure Limited, an Oxford startup company, developer of in-hospital continuous blood glucose monitoring systems, raised $10.9 million in Series C financing round. GlySure has developed a continuous intravascular glucose monitoring system using a proprietary optical fluorescence sensor to tap the $2 Billion global market for implementation of Tight Glycemic Control (TGC) in the hospital Intensive Care Unit (ICU).

Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) announced a major breakthrough in engineering systems of RNA molecules through computer-assisted design, which could lead to important improvements across a range of industries, including the development of cheaper advanced biofuels. Scientists will use these new “RNA machines”, to adjust genetic expression in the cells of microorganisms. This will enable scientists to develop new strains of Escherichia coli (E. coli) that are better able to digest switchgrass biomass and convert released sugars to form three types of transportation fuels – gasoline, diesel and jet fuels.