Nanotechnology Entrepreneurship Challenge Winners Announced

The National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure (NNCI) is pleased to announce the winning teams from the 2022 cohort of the NNCI Nanotechnology Entrepreneurship Challenge (NTEC). Designed as a pre-NSF I-Corps experience, NTEC provides experiential entrepreneurship education for student-led teams.

Eight teams from five NNCI sites participated in the NTEC Accelerator program, a seven-week virtual experience where NTEC teams learned about the importance of customer discovery, business model generation, and how to leverage NNCI resources to develop a nanotechnology-enabled minimum viable product (MVP). Throughout the experience, NTEC students had access to NNCI staff and facilities and received mentorship from entrepreneurs with experience in nanotechnology start-ups. In May, the teams will shared their journey during an NTEC Showcase where external panelists selected the top NNCI NTEC teams. 

The San Diego Nontechnology Infrastructure (SDNI) site won the Top Overall Team Award for a team led by Amer Yaghi with members Tom Park, Abdulhameed Abdal and Elio Li. The team proposed “Bio-Inspired Self-Powered and Flexible Wearable Device for Continuous Detection and Treatment of Parkinson’s Disease”. The supervising faculty were Dr. Shen Xu, Associate Professor of Nanoengineering at UCSD and Dr. Yves Theriault, Executive Director of Education and Outreach at SDNI. Another SDNI team placed second.

NNCI site Southeastern Nanotechnology Infrastructure Corridor (SENIC) and NanoEarth’s Multicultural and Underserved Nanoscience Initiative (MUNI) sponsored a team led by North Carolina A&T State University student Wesley Williams which won the Diversity Award. The project “Molecularly-Imprinted Nanoparticle (MPI) Nanoparticles for the Sensing and Remediation of Toxic Incident Anthropogenically-Derived Nanoplastics in the Hydrosphere” was supervised by faculty member Shyam Aravamudhan, Associate Professor of Nanoengineering and the Director of the Joint School of Nanoscience and Nanoengineering (JSSN) Core Facilities. 

More details about these winning teams can be found on the NanoEarth website. A full article about the SDNI team is available on their website.