Success Stories in the College of Arts and Sciences

Re-investment in research: Hepatitis B Vaccine

Professor Benjamin Hall, in the Department of Biology, has conducted research at UW since 1963. The fundamental research that he and his colleagues carried out on yeast led to the generation of intellectual property that has had an enormous impact on human health around the world. Dr. Hall’s pioneering inventions involved methods for producing recombinant human proteins in yeast, and in a specific application, the production of antigens for the vaccine against Hepatitis B virus now routinely administered to children. Because of the careful protection of this IP, it was possible to strike licensing deals with a number of biopharmaceutical firms for the use of these technologies. This protected IP gave the companies the basis for making significant investments in the development of new, breakthrough medical products based on Dr. Hall’s technologies. To date, over $100 million has been returned to the UW from these inventions, and a substantial portion of that has been directly re-invested in UW research. One vehicle for this re-investment in UW research activities is the Royalty Research Fund.


Broader dissemination of research results: Atmospheric Measurement Device

A team in Atmospheric Sciences, made up of Sarah Masonis, Theodore Anderson, and Robert Charlson, came up with a new way to accurately and directly measure lidar ratios from atmospheric samples. Their lidar nephelometer received its first patent in June 2002. In order to put this new device into the hands of atmospheric scientists around the world, UW recently licensed the invention to TSI Incorporated, who have the experience and capabilities to manufacture and sell the device internationally.


Preserving academic access: WebArchivist

The WebArchivist tool, developed in part by Dr. Kirsten A. Foot in the Department of Communication, was originally designed to analyze the role of the Internet in US elections. The tool has been further developed into a system for identifying, collecting, cataloguing, and analyzing large-scale archives of Web objects in a variety of applications. Supporting research, academic collaborations, and continued public access to data and archives remains a key goal of the project team. It was important that that intellectual property and rights management issues were resolved before WebArchivist was made widely available to the research community.