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November 24, 2006 Vol. 77,
no. 14F
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REWARD: The winning team in the IT category accepts
their $10,000 check. From left, EECS Ph.D. students Daniel
Huang and Qintao Zhang and CET director Ikhlaq Sidhu RACHEL
SHAFER PHOTO
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BioE and EECS teams collect top prizes at the Berkeley Technology Breakthrough Competition
At the third annual Berkeley Technology Breakthrough
Competition hosted by the Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology
(CET), 14 teams of finalists endured scrutiny from judges in an evening
of competition that culminated in the awarding of $25,000 in prize
money. The competition, which took place November 15 at Sibley Auditorium,
featured projects that can be applied within the next five years and “will
significantly make the world a better place.” Though it wasn’t
a business plan competition, the event was judged by venture capitalists,
investors and industry representatives to ensure real-world applicability
and market potential.
This year, faculty and lab scientists also competed, yet in the end,
judges chose two student teams, which each walked away with a $10,000
check. “The projects were impressive,” said In Sik Rhee
(B.S.’93 EECS), one of the judges and a venture advisor with
Accel Partners. “The entries really surprised me by how innovative
and applicable they are now.”
The overall winners in the information technology category were EECS
Ph.D. students Daniel Huang and Qintao Zhang for their “Low-Cost
Disposable Genome Chip.” Under the direction of EECS associate
professor Vivek Subramanian, the pair used organic transistors to produce
a better gene chip. The technology improves upon current methods to
make it easier and less expensive for people to receive diagnoses for
genetic disorders and diseases. “We’re very excited,” says
Zhang. “We’re not sure what we’ll do with the money
yet, but we’ll celebrate with a nice dinner.”
In the science category, the overall winners were BioE Ph.D. students
J. Tanner Nevill and Nicholas Toriello for “SeroScreen: A Disposable
Microdevice for Point-of-Care Diagnostics,” which uses a simple
electrical detection scheme to detect dengue fever in developing countries.
(Read more about their lab-on-a-chip and field work at www.coe.berkeley.edu/engnews/Fall06/EN07F/ecuador.html.) The pair had just returned from a conference in
Japan and, despite sleep deprivation, explained their project well
enough to impress judges. “I thought it might have been a dream
when I woke up this morning,” says Nevill, “until I saw
the four-foot check in my living room.”
Three teams walked away with $1,000 each. For “Greatest Social
Impact,” IEOR Ph.D. candidates Anand Kulkarni and Ephrat Bitton
won for their project “iCare: Direct Person-to-Person Charity
for Efficient Disaster Relief.” For “Best Algorithm,” EECS
Ph.D. student Jiwoong Lee and EECS professor Jean Walrand won for “ZeroCollision
Network Technology.” And for “Best Creativity,” BioE
graduate student Patrick Goodwill, Haas student Raphael Michel and
BioE associate professor Steve Conolly won for “Pre-Polarized
MRI Imaging for Non-Invasive Diagnosis Near Metal Implants.”
“It just shows how wide and how broad innovation at Berkeley is,” says
CET director Ikhlaq Sidhu.
Learn more about CET and the competition at http://cet.berkeley.edu.
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