Grant promotes faster application of health care technology

By fostering early-stage collaborations between UW–Madison biomedical engineering researchers and practicing physicians, a new initiative will enable researchers to deliver their advances more quickly to the patients who need them.

The department of biomedical engineering is one of only nine departments in the nation to receive a Wallace H. Coulter Foundation Translational Research Partnership Award in Biomedical Engineering. The award will provide $580,000 per year for five years.

Biomedical researchers engage in translational research when they focus on developing practical solutions that address particular clinical problems or unmet clinical needs.

“Such research is particularly important in health care, because when advances move quickly from the lab bench to bedside, patients are the ultimate winners,” says Professor Robert Radwin, chair of biomedical engineering and the grant’s principal investigator.

Through its award, the Coulter Foundation will form a working partnership with the department to promote, develop and support translational research via a number of initiatives. Those include: funding promising research projects, increasing and supporting effective collaborations between biomedical engineers and clinicians, and promoting sustainable methods for moving promising technologies into clinical application.