TenU Intern Visits MIT

Hannah Burnau, the first TenU-MIT TLO Intern, writes about her trip to MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which was sponsored by TenU. The trip included meeting with the team of MIT’s Technology Licensing Office (MIT TLO), as well as with Ananay Aguilar, Head of TenU, exploring the campus and visiting the MIT Museum. A science graduate and JD candidate, Hannah shares her reflections and adds: “I hope to work in the technology transfer and patent field.”

*Exploring campus, stopping at landmarks like The Alchemist.*

As part of my experience as the first TenU-MIT TLO Intern, TenU sponsored my travels to MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts to connect with my line manager, Ananay Aguilar, the head of TenU. She came all the way from the UK to learn more about Boston’s innovation ecosystem. TenU is an international collaboration of ten leading university technology transfer offices that provides programming, research, policy initiatives, and more (read more here). My internship was a novel, fully remote position offering support to TenU’s research and marketing activities, so I was very grateful for the opportunity to finally meet with colleagues in person!

First, I was able to finally attend a meeting with MIT’s TLO team! It was wonderful to be in the weekly case meeting, tour the office, and connect with everyone from the incredible TLO team, including patent attorneys and technology licensing officers. I also attended a meeting with Ananay and the Deshpande Center at MIT, which provides grant and transitional funding for getting innovations from lab to market and works to provide mentorship to entrepreneurial professors.

I gained a better understanding of current cases at the TLO, as well. There were technologies about human movement to create textiles, as well as physical sciences disclosures on the interactions of photons and electrons to develop 5G infrastructure. I saw new life sciences facilities on campus while walking to grab coffee with colleagues. The shift from its traditional academic sectors into biotech has been seismic for MIT, and this transformation has brought light to underrepresented groups and health issues. This was further evidenced by the International Women’s Day event at iHQ on MIT’s Healthcare Ecosystem, which I was able to attend with Lesley Millar-Nicholson and phenomenal supervisor Robyn Bunch. Stories were shared about entrepreneurship and mentoring, the need for adequacy of representation in clinical trials, and availability of venture capital (VC) for female-led companies focused on women’s health. The entire MIT and TenU communities are redirecting toward diversity, equity, and inclusion not only in events and directives but also research itself.

I was then able to tour some of the campus halls which combine grab and go restaurant options, the infamous banana room which supplies enough fruit for campus daily, interactive AI and computer games, lab and prototyping spaces, classrooms, dorms, and study spaces. I learned that the Office of Innovation, TLO, and other centers hold office hours for students at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and approach students to inquire whether they would like to learn more about IP. Every inch of the university has been utilized to showcase the quirkiness and intelligence of the ecosystem, enable students to achieve work-life balance, and encourage collaborative learning. Outside one’s curriculum, skills in enterprising, leadership, and getting from lab to market can be gained right in Kendall Square. It’s true what a campus fireman once said: that an MIT education is like drinking from a firehose. What other schools encourage so much hacking, after all?

Reflection and Lessons Learned

I learned so much in a couple of days it is difficult to put into a few words. However, here are a few takeaways. Entrepreneurship resources and sponsorship are often freely given to students without any guarantee of immediate return on investment (ROI), if any at all. There are many protections in place for students, staff, and faculty being mentored in this space. Since students are already familiar with STEM, the focus is on growing their ideas and businesses without exploitation of their knowledge. Many campus programs operate like kickstarters, usually giving venture capital or grants with no strings attached, and without the need for competition. There appears to be guidance through kickstarters to direct research efforts toward major policy areas of the day, whether down syndrome, women’s health, climate change, etc., but maybe there is more room for hands-on experience with the laws and policies guiding higher level decision-making and potential funding opportunities, such as from the US government (NSF, NIST, Chips and Science Act) that might be available to campus groups. How can we narrow in on the biggest problems and use the phenomenal ecosystem as both a starting and ending point to solve them?

Fashion and Technology

Another interesting topic that came up often during the visit was the intersection of fashion design and technology. This has always been a personal and professional interest of mine. In the TLO case meeting, the story of innovator Dr. Dava Newman was highlighted including her designer spacesuits. Additional applications for this technology could be wearables in a changing climate and sports performance. For more information, visit: https://davanewman.com/. The lobby of the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research analogized cell biology and the fabric of life with fashion, below. In the newly opened MIT Museum was a display of the necessity, evolution, and ecological impact of the textile industry, pictured. Another display showed Dr. Diana Scherer’s artificial textile made using grass roots to bring social commentary about the Anthropocene. The comparison between the brain of a plant (its root system) and the brains of people shows that domesticated plants (and humans) respond to environmental controls in observable and interwoven ways. Many unconventional techniques combining art, design, and technology create never before seen inventions that are protectable with IP and beneficial for solving some of the most complex problems in the world.

*Koch Institute exhibit on cancer research and fashion design.*

MIT Museum

While visiting Cambridge and Kendall Square, the brand new MIT Museum is a must-see. The first words along the wall on the first level encompass the MIT mission perfectly, “passion, curiosity, radical acceptance, collaboration, weirdness, humor, write-in.” I enjoyed learning about MIT’s collaborations with NASA including methods for finding exoplanets. I also listened to the sound of a blackhole, see figures below.

These exhibits show the importance of government research partnerships with universities. In the adjacent room was a call to action on environmental challenges and genetically modified organisms, including a timeline on the development of CRISPR. The Broad Institute has been at the center of CRISPR patentability in the US. Another project suggests changing genes in chickens such that their feathers and bones become pink, raising awareness of human consumption, below. In the next section, I used AI to write a “poem” about tech transfer. Through conversations with colleagues about the increasing importance of AI, its potential for rapidly finding information is of interest. I was also fascinated by a chips display after conducting substantial policy research on the topic for TenU, especially following the new CHIPS and Science Act in the US. The Act holds promise to bring back US manufacturing, train a new workforce including through higher education and providing childcare, and move the world forward with advanced chip technology. Policy critique was often at the forefront of the presentations in the MIT Museum, as were truly remarkable research accomplishments.

Boston and Cambridge

In addition to spending time in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to see MIT, I was also able to explore Boston. After 13.5-hour drive there and back (about 27 hours total), the trip was definitely worth every mile! I have a lot to think about following law school graduation one year from now and reaffirmed that I hope to work in the technology transfer and patent field.

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