2020 - Technion - Israel Institute of Technology

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EIT Food has been awarded the notable EIT Label Certificate for two of their flagship education programmes – Masters in Food Systems and the doctoral Global Food Venture program.

EIT Food is a European innovation body with a mission to educate the new generation of entrepreneurs and innovators to transform the food system onto a more sustainable and healthier path. Over 74 students are currently enrolled in the Master programme and 100 students have completed the PhD which focuses on innovation, entrepreneurship, creativity and leadership. Students who have successfully passed an EIT-labelled educational programme will be provided with the skillset to create real impact in business and address major food system challenges.

From January 2021, recruitment is open for the next cohort of entrepreneurs set to develop cutting edge solutions to societal problems. Interested participants can find out more via the EIT Food website. Both programmes are supported by over 15 leading European universities which support a diverse network of Pan-European students.

Dr Maarten van der Kamp, Director of Education at EIT Food, states:

“This major achievement demonstrates the commitment of EIT Food Education and their Partner Network to develop and implement highly innovative, relevant programmes to nurture top talent that will drive positive impact throughout the food system. The EIT Label clearly signals to employers that the graduates from the programme are equipped to act as innovators and respond to societal challenges. They have the entrepreneurial and technical skills to imagine and drive innovations towards a world where everybody can access and enjoy sustainable, safe and healthy food, with trust and fairness from farm to fork. We are already welcoming the EIT Label Review for next year and are hoping this is only the starting point of having our other programmes awarded the EIT Label too.”

Master of Food Systems – Programme of EIT Food Education

The Programme “Master in Food Systems” (MFS), developed by six participating universities, is an integrated graduate degree programme organised by academic institutions and industrial partners from across the EIT Food pan-European partner network. Its goal is to prepare students to drive a future transformation of the food system. The MFS programme promotes a deep knowledge of the food system as an integrated value chain by providing students with the opportunity to study consecutively at three academic institutions which provide distinctly different semester blocks, each one of them focusing on specific areas of the food system. This is coupled with partner-mentored activities and thesis work jointly offered by pan-European industrial partners.

Currently, six universities are participating, which include: University of Madrid, Queen’s University of Belfast, University of Warsaw, University of Reading, University of Turin and University of Hohenheim.

Rieke Sproten, Belgian student in the Master of Food Systems Programme, commented: “I consider the network one of the biggest advantages of the programme and I plan to continue to make use of it long after I graduate. The Master also made me realise that it’s a huge advantage to gain knowledge across many fields, rather than being a specialist in only one area. The course gave me the ability to look at things from a different, broader perspective and allowed me to assume the position of “dot-connector“ – so finding relationships between stakeholders and between seemingly unrelated things to better solve problems.”

Global Food Venture – Programme of EIT Food Education

The Global Food Venture Programme supports highly-qualified PhD students from across Europe to transform their research into viable business in the Food & AgTech space.

The programme fosters the entrepreneurial growth of doctoral students working on challenges in the Agrifood sector. Young innovators gain essential business creation skills and knowledge through a bespoke 6-Month Curriculum of Training Bootcamps, Mentoring, Corporate Site Visits, Global Networking Events and Pitch Competitions. In this period, they are supported by top coaches and technology experts from EIT Food partners and have the unique chance to explore key innovation ecosystems in Europe.

Currently, the following partners are involved in this course: Autonomous University of Madrid, IMDEA Food Institute Madrid, Queen’s University of Belfast, University of Warsaw, Aarhus University Denmark, EPFL Swiss Polytechnic Federal School, ETH Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zürich, University of Leuven, Technical University of München, and Technion Israel Institute of Technology.

Catarina Chemetova, Portuguese PhD Student in the Global Food Venture Programme, stated: “The Global Food Venture Programme was an amazing experience from the beginning; coaching helped me through all the steps. The Programme improved my entrepreneurial mindset and my project had an organic evolution.”

The Harvey Prize, the Technion’s most prestigious award, will this year be awarded to Distinguished Professor Joseph DeSimone of Stanford University in the Science and Technology category and to Professor Raphael Mechoulam of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in the Human Health category.

The Harvey Prize – established in 1971 by Leo Harvey (1887-1973) – is awarded at the Technion each year for outstanding achievements in science and technology, human health, and significant contributions to humanity. Over the years, the $75,000 prize has become a predictor of the Nobel Prize, and more than 30% of Harvey laureates since 1986 were ultimately awarded the Nobel. Three of them – Professor Emmanuelle Charpentier, Professor Jennifer Doudna, and Professor Reinhard Genzel – are to receive the 2020 Nobel Prize this month.

Prof. Joseph DeSimone

Professor Joseph DeSimone is being awarded for his contributions to materials science, chemistry, polymer science and technology, nano medicine, and 3D printing. His achievements are a model for combining basic scientific discoveries with developments of industrial technologies that have a significant influence on mankind. His pioneering scientific breakthroughs include the use of supercritical carbon dioxide to produce fluoropolymers; a new process for precise fabrication of nanoparticles (PRINT) widely used in medical applications.

He has published more than 350 articles in leading scientific journals and is a named inventor on more than 200 issued patents. In the 1990s he and his students developed an environmentally friendly technology for manufacturing polymers. This “green” synthesis process, commercialized by DuPont, makes the use of hazardous solvents for the synthesis of fluoropolymer materials unnecessary. His research team also developed CO2 adsorbents to enable “green” cleaning processes.

Another technology developed by his team is PRINT (particle replication in non-wetting templates) – the only method that enables large-scale production of uniform nanoparticles for medical applications, with precise control over particle parameters such as size, shape, and composition. Using PRINT, the biotechnology company Liquidia Technologies was established. It engages in precision medicine for treating pulmonary disease and pain relief and has numerous products in clinical trials.

Prof. DeSimone and his team also developed a technology called CLIP (continuous liquid interface production) that replaces the slow, traditional layer-by-layer 3D printing method. CLIP enables particles to continuously “grow” from a pool of liquid resin, significantly accelerating manufacturing speed and delivering production-grade parts, including those with complex geometries.

Until recently, Prof. DeSimone (b. 1964) was a professor of chemistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This year, he joined Stanford University and is the Sanjiv Sam Gambhir Professor of Translational Medicine, and a faculty member in the Departments of Radiology and Chemical Engineering, with a courtesy appointment at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. He is also an adjunct member at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

Prof. DeSimone is one of only 25 people to be elected to all three branches of the USA National Academies: The National Academy of Sciences, the Institution of Medicine and the National Academy of Engineering. He has received numerous awards, including the Lemelson-MIT Prize, the U.S. Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award and the NIH Director’s Pioneer Award. In 2016 he was recognized by President Barack Obama and received the National Medal of Technology and Innovation – the highest honor in the US for achievement and leadership in the advancement of technological progress.

Prof. Raphael Mechoulam (photograph: Yoram Aschheim)

Professor Raphael Mechoulam of the School of Pharmacology in the Faculty of Medicine at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem is awarded the Harvey Prize for his ground-breaking research elucidating the components, mechanisms of action, and implications for human health of the cannabinoid system. His meticulous decades-long discoveries have impacted the medical understanding of the negative implications of drug abuse as well as provided therapeutic promise to a wide range of diseases and pathological conditions and contributed to human well-being.

Prof. Mechoulam was born in Bulgaria (1930), where he studied chemical engineering. After immigrating to Israel he received his M.Sc. in biochemistry from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his Ph.D. at the Weizmann Institute and completed his postdoctoral studies at the Rockefeller Institute in New York. In 1960 he joined the junior staff of the Weizmann Institute, and in 1985 he became a professor at the Hebrew University.

He is the first researcher to have isolated the psychoactive component of cannabis, THC (Tetrahydrocannabinol), determining its structure and the structure of the second major component of cannabis – Cannabidiol or CBD. Both substances today serve as medicines under the brand names Sativex and Epidiolex.

Professor Mechoulam’s numerous research studies and his pioneering discoveries have created a treatment horizon that encompasses a broad range of illnesses and pathological conditions, thus bettering the wellbeing of humanity. Among other things, his research has led to the development of innovative treatments for epilepsy, MS, and pain relief.

For his tremendous achievements in research, Prof. Mechoulam has been bestowed with much recognition and a myriad of prestigious honors, including the Israel Prize in Exact Sciences – Chemistry (2000) and the Kolthoff Prize in Chemistry from the Technion. He is a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. In 2014, Prof. Mechoulam was named one of the “World’s 50 Most Influential Jews” by the Jerusalem Post.

Prof. Ziv is the first Israeli to win the Medal of Honor – the most prestigious award given by the IEEE and one of the most prestigious in the world of technology

The IEEE Medal of Honor, which is one of the most prestigious awards in technology, has been granted to Distinguished Prof. Jacob Ziv (Emeritus) of the Viterbi Faculty of Electrical Engineering at Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. Dist. Prof Ziv is the first Israeli to have won this honor from the International Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

Dist. Prof. Ziv is a world pioneer in the field of information theory, and he is co-inventor of both the Lempel-Ziv algorithm and the Wyner-Ziv algorithm. He receives the medal for his:

“Fundamental contributions to information theory and data compression technology, and for distinguished research leadership.”

IEEE is the world’s largest technical-professional organization, with about half a million members in 150 countries. The association’s Medal of Honor has been awarded to a single winner each year since 1917, in recognition of an exceptional contribution to science and technology. This is IEEE’s most prestigious award and one of the most prestigious in the world of technology, honoring scientists whose exceptional achievements have left a mark for years on technology, society, and engineering.

The winners of the medal have included individuals who have shaped the fields of information, communication, electronics and computing. They include: Claude Shannon, father of information theory; Guglielmo Marconi, inventor of wireless; Gordon Moore, who drafted Moore’s Law; Andrew Grove, who was CEO and chairman of Intel; Harry Nyquist, one of the most prominent figures in communication and system theory; and founders of Qualcomm Dr. Irwin Jacobs and Prof. Andrew Viterbi (who made a significant contribution to the Electrical Engineering Faculty at the Technion which has since been named after him and his late wife Erna).

According to Dean of the Andrew & Erna Viterbi Faculty of Electrical Engineering Prof. Nahum Shimkin: “There is no one more worthy of this award than Distinguished Prof. Ziv. This is a great honor for the Faculty and the Technion as well.”

“This is a great honor for Dist. Prof. Ziv and the Technion,” said Technion President Prof. Uri Sivan. “His groundbreaking scientific and applied contributions are a source of inspiration for the best engineers in the world. His research in the Faculty of Electrical Engineering has brought about a significant revolution that laid the foundations for the Israeli Startup Nation.”

Born in 1931, Prof. Ziv, completed a bachelor’s and master’s degree in electrical engineering at the Technion, followed by a doctorate at MIT (1962). After some eight years of research and development at Raphael and Bell Labs in the United States, he joined the Technion faculty. Over the years he has held senior positions including Vice President of the Technion for Academic Affairs, Chairman of the Planning and Budgeting Committee, and President of the Israeli Academy of Sciences. He is a member of the US National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Dist. Prof. Ziv has won many prestigious awards, including the Israel Defense Award (twice), the Israel Prize in Exact Sciences (1993) the Marconi Award (1995), the Richard Heming Medal (1995), the Shannon Award (1997), the Frontiers of Knowledge Award from the BBVA Foundation (2009), and the EMET Prize (2017).

In 1977, Prof Ziv and Prof. Abraham Lempel of the Faculty of Computer Science published the initial version of the Lempel-Ziv algorithm, and in 1978 the second version. Both versions served as the basis for essential compression technologies including PNG, TIFF, ZIP and GIF and played a major role in PDF (for documents) and MP3 (for music) formats. This is an information compression algorithm that enables lossless compression, regardless of the structure of the data and without prior knowledge of the statistical properties of the data. Based on this algorithm, many of the compression technologies currently used today in memory devices, computers and smartphones were developed.

The Lempel-Ziv algorithm has opened the way for unprecedented technology, enabling the transfer of visual and other information at high speed without loss of information. In 2004, the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) announced that the Lempel-Ziv algorithm is “a milestone in electronics and computer engineering” and that it “made a significant contribution to making the internet an effective means of global communication.”

Dist. Prof. Ziv also participated in the development of the Wyner-Ziv algorithm in Bell Laboratories. This algorithm, which is now part of Microsoft’s operating system, allows the compression of many images from different cameras, and their simultaneous transmission (for example in sports events).

Members of winning group participated in EIT FAN program, held in Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering at the Technion in collaboration with Strauss Group

Yair Yosefi

Israeli startup The Mediterranean Food Lab is one of the three winners in the EIT Food Accelerator Network (EIT FAN) program. EIT Food, Europe’s leading food initiative, aims to accelerate startups that will shape the food world in the coming decades. The Mediterranean Food Lab was founded by Yair Yosefi, Omer Ben Gal, and B.Z. (Ben) Goldberg, who joined forces to harness their individual research and development expertise in plant-based flavoring agents to establish the startup.

Created by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) in 2018, EIT FAN was held for the third time this year in the Technion Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering and five other hubs in Switzerland, Germany, the UK, Spain and Finland. The program at the Technion is run in collaboration with Strauss Group, and is one of the first programs to focus on the cultivation of innovation and entrepreneurship in the food sector.

This year, 60 companies were selected from 400 applicants to participate in EIT FAN across its six hubs. In Israel, the program took place at the Technion, under the leadership of Associate Professor Uri Lesmes (Academic Director), Dr. Avital Regev Siman-Tov (CEO) and Prof. Eyal Shimoni (Strauss Group), with the participation of ten startups from Israel, Italy, and the UK. Two outstanding companies from each hub progressed to the final stage of the European contest, where the top 3 finalists were selected by a professional international panel of academic and industry experts.

Omer Ben Gal

The three winners in the European finals are startups active in different categories: The Mediterranean Food Lab of Israel, develops natural solutions that improve the deliciousness of plant-based foods in general and meat alternatives in particular; Odd.Bot of the Netherlands, which developed the “Weed Whacker”, an intelligent in-row weeding robot that will reduce the use of crop protection products; and UK-based Arborea, which has developed artificial BioSolar leaves that generate breathable oxygen and remove carbon dioxide from the air. Each of the companies will receive €100,000.

The Mediterranean Food Lab develops natural, healthy flavor bases that are sustainably produced and affordable, using novel modalities based on traditional, multi-phase, solid state fermentation of plantprotein. This year, the company also won a grant from the Good Food Institute to research the potential of traditional Southeast Asian foods for the development of rich flavors for the alternative meat sector.

B.Z. Goldberg, CEO and R&D Director of The Mediterranean Food Lab, explained that the rapid expansion of the alternative meat sector is thus far mainly limited to emulating meat as a main protein serving, “a large piece of protein that sits in the middle of your plate, such as hamburgers, steaks, chicken nuggets, etc.” However, large pieces of protein account for only 20% of the global meat market by volume. By contrast, the use of meat to enhance and improve the flavor other foods accounts for 30% of the market. “Even if we stop slaughtering animals to produce hamburgers and steak, the food world will still need billions of animals each year to feed our appetite for the flavor enhancing qualities and meaty flavor profile presently delivered by animal protein, unless there is a great tasting alternative. And that is what we’re working on,” he said.

Goldberg explains that the accelerator program at the Technion, which included intensive studies, access to mentors from industry, and ongoing advice from the staff of the Technion’s Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering, gave the company highly significant impetus. Winning the finals of the local competition at the Technion granted The Mediterranean Food Lab a ticket to compete in the European finals of the program, against other outstanding companies that had been declared winners in the various European hubs.

“We believe innovation holds the key to fixing our food system so that it is healthier and more sustainable for all”, said Benoit Buntinx, Director of Business Creation at EIT Food. “These startups and scaleups represent the inclusivity and innovation of the EIT Food community and embody the important role entrepreneurs will play, if we are to accelerate the transformation of the food system.”

B.Z. (Ben) Goldberg

“The EIT Food Accelerator Network is a unique pan-European program established to catalyze significant breakthroughs, mainly by providing support and advice to new startups and entrepreneurs,” said Prof. Uri Lesmes of the Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering. “The companies that participated in the program at the Technion are engaged in finding food alternatives and in enriching the food chain as we know it – a common trend in the food world today. This year the COVID-19 crisis forced us to exercise our Israeli agility and adapt the program into a hybrid format, integrating online learning with practical workshops at the Faculty. I am proud to say we were the only hub to do so, and to persist in fostering the growth of startups. This continues to support Israel’s leading position at the forefront of food-tech innovation. Israeli entrepreneurs have brought creativity and daring to the food sector, and it is not without reason that Israel is an important player in the global food-tech industry.”

Dr. Avi Shpigelman, also of the Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering, and one of the lecturers of EIT FAN at the Technion, said, “the uniqueness of the program lies in the integration of knowledge and skills from the academic world and industry, and in the program’s location within the Faculty, which also places its advanced infrastructure at the participants’ disposal.”

According to Dr. Avital Regev Siman-Tov, director of the program in Israel, “The program reflects the spirit of the Israeli startup nation and the knowledge it has accumulated and exposes participants to a unique combination of lectures, practical workshops, mentors and leading industry experts. In fact, the program we crafted at the Technion together with Strauss has become one of the cornerstones of the European acceleration program, which will soon be beginning its fourth year of activity.”

This is the second time in the three years that the winner of the prestigious EIT-FAN finals is a participant of the program at the Technion. In the program’s first year it was Redefine Meat – an Israeli company that developed a 3D meat printing technology to creating animal-free “whole muscle” cuts of meat (e.g. steaks) with the appearance, texture, and flavor of real meat, but made from natural plant-based sustainable materials. Redefine Meat’s CEO, Eshchar Ben-Shitrit, said participation in EIT-FAN at the Technion and winning the competition were a significant milestone in the company’s development, fundraising, and team growth.

Israeli start-up H2PRO was named “best company in the scale-up track” in the international New Energy Challenge competition, a prestigious event organized annually by Royal Dutch Shell. H2PRO was founded based on an innovative green energy technology invented at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology that produces hydrogen efficiently, inexpensively, and safely.

(L-R) : Prof. Gideon Grader, Avigail Landman , Prof. Avner Rothschild and Dr. Hen Dotan

H2PRO was one of just five finalists in the 2020 competition. In addition to being the youngest company on the list, it was also the only one from Israel. H2PRO’s innovative technology heralds a new era of green hydrogen production by splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen using electrical power. Traditional electrolysis produces hydrogen and oxygen simultaneously, which requires a membrane to separate them. The use of a membrane makes the system and the process significantly more expensive. Green hydrogen is an alternative fuel that can replace oil and natural gas in the long term. It plays a critical role in the reduction of polluting vehicle emissions, as well as in clean production of materials and chemicals, heating and storing renewable energy.

The new technology renders the membrane unnecessary, since the two gases are produced at different stages. The technology also increases energy efficiency by 20-25% compared to the alternatives; significantly improves the safety of the production process; reduces the cost of building the system to approximately one half; and increases the pressure of the produced hydrogen, thereby reducing the cost of downstream hydrogen compression.

H2PRO was founded in 2019 by Technion researchers Professor Gideon Grader (Faculty of Chemical Engineering), Professor Avner Rothschild, and Dr. Hen Dotan (Faculty of Materials Science and Engineering), in collaboration with the founders of Viber, which is headed by entrepreneur Talmon Marco.

The company received an exclusive license to commercialize the technology from T3, Technion’s technology transfer unit. To date, it has raised capital from Hyundai, Sumitomo, and Bazan, and from private investors and funds. The research that led to the establishment of H2PRO was supported by the Nancy and Stephen Grand Technion Energy Program (GTEP), a donation by businessman and Technion supporter Ed Satell, the Adelis Foundation, Israel’s Ministry of Energy and the European Commission (the EU’s 2020 program). The research was conducted together with Dr. Avigail Landman, who was a Ph.D. student of both Prof. Rothschild and Prof. Grader.

The Technion – Israel Institute of Technology launches the Schulich Leaders Entrepreneurship Program with 15 outstanding students from various faculties.

The Technion – Israel Institute of Technology has launched the Schulich Leaders Entrepreneurship Program, a new flagship program for outstanding students. The 15 pioneers of the Technion program, male and female students in various faculties, will participate in the opening ceremony of the national program, which will take place online today, Thursday, November 19. The ceremony will be attended by members of the Schulich family, Education Minister Yoav Galant, Senior Executive Vice President of the Technion Professor Oded Rabinovitch, Vice President for External Relations and Resource Development Professor Alon Wolf, and Uri Karmi, the director of the Schulich Foundation in Israel. The professional lecture at the event will be delivered by Waze founder Uri Levine.

“Entrepreneurship is a way of life for us at the Technion, and it is deeply ingrained in our organizational DNA,” said Technion President Professor Uri Sivan. “Many reality-changing developments that emerged from the Technion affected the lives of millions in Israel and around the world. We put a lot of effort into instilling these entrepreneurial values and spirit in all of our students. The Schulich Entrepreneurial Leadership program will now become the highlight of all these efforts and enable the future generation of entrepreneurs in Israel to be nurtured and trained. I thank the Schulich Foundation from the bottom of my heart for the shared vision and expression of trust.”

The new Entrepreneurship program, which will commence this year at the Technion, will provide its participants with an entrepreneurial toolbox and guidance in developing an idea for practical development. According to the head of the program, Professor Daniella Raveh from the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, “Every year 15 students will join the program, and each will receive generous support and close guidance on leadership and involvement issues. This is a small, high-quality group of students whose influence will reach far beyond the program’s borders. we intend for the participants in the ‘Schulich Leaders’ program to become the flag bearers of entrepreneurship, innovation, and leadership at the Technion.”

Canadian entrepreneur and philanthropist Seymour Schulich, heads the Schulich family, who has to date donated some $350 million to various causes, most of them in higher education and health in Canada, the United States, and Israel. The partnership between the Schulichs and the Technion has been ongoing for over a decade and began with the Schulich Faculty of Chemistry and the Schulich Leader Scholarships, the most prestigious scholarship program in Israel that has been operating at the Technion until this year.

The Schulich Leaders Entrepreneurship program will provide its participants with generous support that includes a living scholarship of NIS 25,000 per year and a tuition scholarship.

“Since its inception, the Technion has been a source of technological innovation whose impact can be seen all over the world,” said Uri Karmi, director of the Schulich Foundation in Israel. “We hope and look forward to seeing the graduates of the program continue in this tradition, building successful companies and producing positive change in the world.”

The first group of students in the program includes Itay Nakash, Shir Barkan, Liad Perl, Adi Makhoul, Haneen Naaran, Harel Mendelman, Michal Maymon, Elia Suleimanov, Roni Ashkenazy, Ron Hudadi, Asaf Aaronson, Roy Levy, Hilel Sahar, Rotem Elimelech, and Nitzan Mashall.

Click here to get to know them.

50New technology developed by the Technion and Embryonics is expected to dramatically improve IVF success rates. The article is published on the 43rd anniversary of the first IVF procedure

Forty-three years ago, on November 10, 1977, an in-vitro fertilization (IVF) procedure in humans was undertaken for the first time in history. Eight and a half months later, the world’s first test-tube baby, Louise Joy Brown, was born, and September 1982 saw the birth of the first test-tube baby in Israel, Romy Neumark. In 2010, when 28-year-old Neumark was already a well-known anchor on Channel 10 News, one of the pioneers of the method, Prof. Robert Edwards of Cambridge University, was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine.

In-vitro fertilization is in many cases the only solution available to future parents such as single moms, same-sex couples, couples suffering from genetic disorders of the reproductive system, and others. In the procedure, the woman undergoes a treatment that increases the number of ova (eggs), the mature eggs are retrieved from the ovaries and are fertilized by the man’s sperm in the laboratory. Several days later, after the fertilized eggs have become embryos, some of these embryos are implanted in the woman’s uterus.

Negative predictive values generated by the new system (green) compared to the expert panel (orange) and a random prediction (black).

Despite the importance of IVF, success rates remain below 40%. This is due, among other things, to the right selection of the embryos that will be implanted in the uterus – a process that is still performed manually by the embryologist and without any clear, uniform criteria.

This picture is likely to change dramatically thanks to Ubar – an innovative technology developed by researchers of the Taub Faculty of Computer Science at the Technion and Embryonics. The technology, which betters the selection of embryos and raises it to unprecedented levels, is now presented on the website of MIDL – the Medical Imaging with Deep Learning Conference – in an article published in an open peer review. The technology was developed by Prof. Alex Bronstein of the Taub Faculty of Computer Science and Embryonics founders David Silver, who studied at the Technion in the Rothschild Scholars Program for Excellence, and Dr. Yael Gold-Zamir, the company’s CEO.

In the article, the researchers describe a novel data-driven system that is expected to dramatically improve successful outcomes of embryo implantation, as evidenced by time-lapse imaging videos. The study is based on 8,789 such videos, of which verified data on the success of the pregnancy exists with regard to 272 embryos. The automatic system’s predictions were compared to predictions by an expert panel of embryologists, who are experienced in this field, and Ubar demonstrated a dramatic improvement in embryo selection, with a 12% increase in positive predictive values (success of the procedure) and a 29% increase in negative predictive values (rejection of embryos due to low implantation probability).

The study was supported by the Israel Innovation Authority.

Source

Researchers at the Technion Faculty of Biology have discovered protein channelrhodopsins, acquired and evolved from algae into giant viruses that infect them

Researchers at the Technion Faculty of Biology have for the first time discovered unique photoreceptors in marine giant viruses and the algae they infect. The study, published in Current Biology, was performed by lead researcher Professor Oded Béjà and postdoctoral researcher Dr. Andrey Rozenberg.

Viruses (antennae) attacking algae

Prof. Béjà’s research team studies microbial rhodopsins, proteins that help unicellular organisms to harvest light energy (in a process that differs from photosynthesis) and also detect light in a way remotely similar to animal vision. This study focused on the family of the light-activated ion channels called channelrhodopsins (ChRs), microbial rhodopsins that directly translate absorbed light into ion fluxes across cellular membranes. These proteins, which naturally originate in unicellular algae, are used in neuroscience as the main optogenetic tool for precise manipulation – stimulation and inhibition – of neurons and other excitable cells, through the use of light. Optogenetics has caused a revolution in neuroscience research and today is considered to be the best method for activating specific cells to examine their impact on the functioning of the organism.

Channelrhodopsins, which were first discovered as green algal proteins localized to the so-called eyespots, help the proteins find optimal light conditions by driving their phototaxis. Diverse channelrhodopsins have been discovered in recent years in other unicellular algae and also non-photosynthetic single-cell organisms.

Dr. Andrey Rozenberg

The Technion’s research team, which performed a metagenomic analysis of seawater, has now found that viruses that infect algae contain genes coding for channelrhodopsins. The search for related proteins brought about the discovery of a whole new family of channelrhodopsins that originated in “primitive” green algae and anion-conducting activity that originated in algae. Through electrophysiological experiments, they demonstrated that the channelrhodopsins from the viruses and the algae function as anion-conducting light-dependent channels.

According to Prof. Béjà, “Our quest led us to the conclusion that the origin of these channelrhodopsins is not in the virus but in the algae that they infect, and we estimate that at some point in the evolutionary process, a giant alga-infecting virus “stole” a channelrhodopsin gene for its own benefit. We hypothesize that the viruses can manipulate the host’s swimming behavior, thus controlling its light responses and directing it to locations where irradiation conditions are favorable for the virus.”

The study is based on data collected in Tara Oceans, a global oceanic research expedition undertaken to collect samples for mapping marine biodiversity, which traveled on board the vessel Tara.

The research project was carried out in collaboration with Professor Peter Hegemann of Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany, and his team.

For the article in Current Biology click here

For the first time, the Minister of Science and Technology and representatives of the United Arab Emirates participated in the final event of the BizTEC Entrepreneurship Program at the Technion. Since the program’s founding in 2004, its graduates have raised more than $750 million.

Dr. Gilad Rosenblatt and Dr. Boris Simkhovich with the system they developed

Dr. Gilad Rosenblatt and Dr. Boris Simkhovich, who completed their degrees at the Technion, are the first-place winners of the BizTEC 2020 program. The decision was announced at the recent final event, which was held online. The two developed LightCode – an innovative technology that accelerates drug discovery by identifying the potential of small molecules to be used in new drugs.

The BizTEC Entrepreneurship program currently operates as part of t-hub – the Technion’s Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center, which is headed by Professor Ezri Tarazi. The program fosters novice entrepreneur who are seeking to develop deep technologies that require interdisciplinary collaboration and in-depth knowledge infrastructure and provides participating teams close professional guidance of mentors from academia and industry. In the 16 years of the program’s existence, its graduates have raised more than $750 million and founded many successful companies, including Houseparty, Breezometer, Via Surgica, Gusto, Augmedics, VocalisHealth, and Windward.

Dr. Boris Simkhovich

This year, despite the coronavirus crisis, the program saw a record number of participants: 110 students and graduates began the program, some 80% of whom were from the Technion. Approximately 30 passed to the semifinals – most of them graduate students at the Technion. The proportion of women in the program increased to 28% and the organizers believe that this trend will continue in the coming years.

“The Coronavirus crisis has brought scientific research and technology back to the forefront and to the public discourse,” said Technion President Prof. Uri Sivan, who opened the event. “Crises of the kind we are experiencing now bring with them not only difficulties but also new opportunities and directions. They challenge paradigms and take us all out of our comfort zone; this is the time for creativity and innovation. They say the need is the mother of all invention. The coronavirus crisis has led to dozens of groundbreaking studies at the Technion, some of which have even matured within a few months into technological commercialization and the establishment of new start-up companies.”

Minister of Science and Technology Izhar Shay was a guest at the event. A graduate of the Viterbi Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the Technion, he is an entrepreneur and investor who developed the entrepreneur’s platform “Startup Stadium” and is included in the list of 70 exemplary people in Israeli high-tech. “I was one of the first investors in BizTEC and it is exciting to see the continuity of the program and the successes of its graduates,” the minister said. On the agreement with the United Arab Emirates, Shay said that his office promotes cooperation with the Emirates and with Bahrain and that he hopes this will lead to the integration of forces between entrepreneurs from Israel and these two countries.

Dr. Gilad Rosenblatt

The event was also attended by representatives from the UAE, including Shrikant Tucker from the Emirati Innovation Authority. Investor Hasan Sleem, an Oxford and Cambridge graduate, congratulated those present and said, “I do not need an introduction regarding the Technion. Twelve years ago, I met an Israeli entrepreneur in London who founded one of the companies I run today. He is a graduate of the Technion – his father taught physics at the Technion and also his partner is a graduate of the Technion – so I know the Technion well. BizTEC is one of the best technology programs in Israel, and it was founded in 2004 – the year I founded Privity, a venture capital consulting firm. So that we are the same age.”

Hassan presented his life with six flags: Pakistan, where his parents were born; Fiji, where he was born; Nigeria, where he grew up; Britain, where he studied at Oxford and Cambridge; Japan – the first country to offer him a job; and the United Arab Emirates, where he works today. He said: “Now, following recent developments in the region, it seems that two parallel lines have met and led to the signing of the agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates on September 15, 2020. I hope new possibilities for cooperation between us and other entrepreneurs will emerge from t-hub, the Technion’s Entrepreneurship Center.”

The BizTEC program is currently run by Ohad Yaniv, who also hosted the event. “The BizTEC program is an elite unit in the field of entrepreneurship programs in the world in general and in the Israeli ecosystem in particular,” he said. It is very rare that there are so many successes coming out of a program designed for projects at very early stages (sometimes entrepreneurs only arrive with an idea only without a presentation). The reasons for this lie in the strong back that the Technion knows to provide entrepreneurs in the program, in the vast experience gained in working with early-stage projects (the program is one of the oldest in the world in the field) and in creating a challenging track that only the most determined entrepreneurs complete. This is a very significant validation for investors who want to know where to put their money. I would like to thank the mentors, judges, lecturers, friends, and partners of the firm Pearl Cohen, Poalim-Tech, the Rothschild Foundation, and especially Yehuda and Dita Bronicki for their backing, contribution, time, and guidance of the competition over the years.”

Along with the winning development, LightCode, the developments of the following groups were presented at the event: A-chord (second place) – early detection of an outbreak in schizophrenia patients; Harmony (third place) – wearable monitoring device that monitors hormone levels in blood of women undergoing IVF treatment; FootVices – technology for walking rehabilitation; SoundFlow – monitoring significant changes in blood flow in blood vessels; A-Lectio – an open knowledge library that connects members of the scientific community on a digital platform, allowing them to create and consume knowledge and manage it; EasyLine – a new catheterization technology that significantly reduces the failure rates in such surgeries; Experium – a wearable system that reduces the exposure of medical staff to airborne viruses and bacteria; and WatchAfter – technology for the automatic detection of child abuse in kindergartens and preschools.

The science behind the winner

LightCode system

The first-place winners, Gilad Rosenblatt and Boris Simkhovich, developed LightCode – an innovative technology that accelerates drug discovery by identifying the potential of small molecules to be used in new drugs. Developing a new drug takes about a decade and requires an investment of billions of dollars. Despite this, about 90% of the drugs that reach clinical development stages “fall” on the way to the market. The high failure rates lead to a low return on investment and drive the very high prices of new drugs.

The majority of drugs are based on small molecules that bind to proteins in the body. Therefore, one of the major challenges in drug development is the identification of molecules that will desirably bind to those proteins. The problem is that the number of potential molecules is greater than the number of stars in the sky, so to find a suitable molecule sometimes requires screening about a million molecules.

In recent years, a new approach to drug discovery has been emerging, and it is based on fragments – very small molecules that serve as chemical building blocks that make up the drug molecule. This approach holds that the right choice of fragments will allow the creation of a drug molecule with higher success rates while cutting development costs and time. Thus emerged the need to characterize those fragments and identify their potential to bind to the target protein. However, because fragments are very small, their molecular binding interactions with the protein are weak and hard to detect.

The devices that do this today are divided into those that provide high-throughput results (many tests at a given time) but with limited reliability, and those that provide accurate but low-rate results (for example magnetic resonance devices).

The combination of speed and accuracy in the same device is a huge challenge that encounters many obstacles. This is the challenge that the new system solves.

The development of Rosenblatt and Simkhovich is based on the discoveries of unique light waves occurring in nanostructures. The discovery, made as part of Rosenblatt’s doctoral dissertation, matured into a prototype system through collaboration between the two. Following an initial proof of feasibility, they received financial assistance from the Israeli Innovation Authority for the purpose of building the system and transformed the fundamental science achievements into a viable technology.

Both are “full” Technion graduates. Simkhovich completed a bachelor’s and master’s degree in physics at the Technion, after which he worked in the semiconductor industry, and a doctorate in nanotechnology under the supervision of Professor Guy Bartel.

Rosenblatt completed a triple bachelor’s degree – electrical engineering, physics, and mathematics – and master’s and doctoral degrees in the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Faculty of Electrical Engineering under the supervision of Professor Meir Orenstein. The two met during their doctorates, after which they began working together in Prof. Orenstein’s research group and published an article in the prestigious journal Physical Review X.

“The Technion shaped my professional and intellectual life,” said Rosenblatt, “and the connection with Boris was excellent both professionally and personally – for example in mountain climbing together. We have come a long way together and learned that new things can be created from arguments and disagreements.”

According to Simkhovich, “The BizTEC program suited us really well during this period, when we were already in the midst of proving practical feasibility. The program has advanced us a lot and provided us with very important tools that help us translate the development into a business platform.”

Rosenblatt noted that, “Ohad Yaniv’s dedication and commitment to the event, and to the program in general, were above and beyond, and this is evident in the success of the program.”

Hundreds of students recently received scholarships totaling NIS 1.7 million ($502,000 U.S.) through Technion’s Dean of Students Office. Valued at thousands of shekels each, the scholarships were granted with the support of Technion, the Technion Alumni Association, Technion Friends Societies in Israel and around the world, and external entities that included the Council for Higher Education’s Planning and Budgetary Committee and the Moshe Meir Horowitz z”l Foundation managed by KKL-JNF. The special emergency assistance scholarships will help students who are struggling with the challenges and ensuing financial hardships of the COVID-19 era.

An overview of the Technion campus in the Carmel Mountains

“My family and I are experiencing very tough times, and this scholarship will help me a lot this year and will keep me on track. One day I hope to be in your shoes – Technion alumni who are now donating scholarships to students – helping people in the position I am in today,” said N., a 22-year-old student who is starting her 4th year in the Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering, when she received the news that Technion approved her request for a “coronavirus scholarship.” I’m very happy to be studying at Technion, a university that always supports its students in every way and in every situation.”

In addition to the scholarships, Technion also substantially expanded the scope of its student support by establishing an emergency loan fund. Every student can receive up to NIS 20,000 ($5,917 US), with no questions asked and regardless of socioeconomic status, to be repaid interest-free and without linkage after the completion of their studies, and even then in a gradual manner. To date, the fund has helped hundreds of students with loans totaling more than NIS 2.5 million ($740,000 US).

Technion also enabled students to defer tuition payments for the Spring semester. and avoided fining those who terminated their dormitory rental contract prematurely because of COVID-19-related disruptions.

“We are intent on guaranteeing that the coronavirus crisis will not disrupt the continuity of any student’s studies at Technion,” said Technion President Professor Uri Sivan. “During this academic year as well, we will continue to support students through scholarships, loans, and other channels thanks to the help of Technion’s friends in Israel and around the world, and thanks to an additional emergency budget from the Council of Higher Education’s Planning and Budgetary Committee. The support our students are receiving at this time from our friends around the world imbues new meaning to the phrase “the Technion family.’”

According to Technion’s Dean of Students Professor Ayelet Fishman, “the hardships triggered by the pandemic generated an exceptionally large number of requests for financial aid and for dormitory space. We granted the scholarships according to clearly defined and consistent criteria. Now we are trying to raise funds to help students who are slightly below the acceptance threshold.”

Demand for dorms also exceeds the supply, and here too, Technion is actively seeking the best possible solutions. In recent years, Technion has invested enormous resources in order to increase the dormitory space available to students, and today it is the leading university in Israel as regards students living on campus.

Among the donors to the current student aid campaign, there is one married couple that stands out: Tal Allon, Director of the Hod HaCarmel School for Excellence in Science, and his wife Karin Rosenthal decided to donate the “Coronavirus grants” they received from the government to Technion’s students.

Sigal First, Chair of the Technion Alumni Association, explained: “Tal Allon approached us with a request to donate his and his wife’s government grants in order to fund student scholarships. They inspired the Technion Alumni Association to launch a campaign to encourage people to donate their government coronavirus grants. We have already succeeded in raising tens of thousands of shekels donated by different generations of Technion graduates on behalf of current students. The Alumni Association constantly strives to strengthen the connection between Technion graduates and students, and the term ‘Technion family’ is always on our minds. The family’s strength is measured in days of hardship and we invite all alumni to contribute to this initiative.”

The Technion Friends Society in Israel is also part of this effort. “We would like to thank Technion’s friends in Israel who are donating to Technion’s emergency fund for students in need,” said Professor Peretz Lavie, Chair of the Technion Friends Society in Israel. “The generosity of our friends during these difficult times of economic uncertainty is a great source of pride and appreciation. Without their help, many students would have had to abandon their studies.”