Cancer treatments and Panama Canal efficiency: Purdue Innovates Incubator funds projects to advance university innovations

2 Purdue researchers received $100,000 in latest round of Trask Innovation Fund awards

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind., June 26, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Purdue University researchers in the colleges of Agriculture, Engineering and Science have received $100,000 from the Trask Innovation Fund to develop Purdue-owned intellectual property for commercial use.
The patented and patent-pending innovations are in the fields of cancer treatments and freshwater management.
The fund is managed by the Purdue Innovates Incubator, which provides programming for the Purdue community to ideate, refine and support their solutions. Funding recipients can receive up to $50,000 for their initial project; they may reapply a maximum of three times to receive up to an aggregate cap of $100,000 to support the same technology.
The spring 2025 Trask Innovation Fund recipients, their projects and award amounts are:
Andrew Mesecar, College of Agriculture, College of Science, Purdue Institute for Cancer Research; “Development of Ubiquitin Specific Protease 7 (USP7) Inhibitors as Treatments for Hepatocellular Carcinoma”; $50,000
Mesecar is a Distinguished Professor of Biochemistry, the Walther Professor in Cancer Structural Biology and the Robert Wallace Miller Director of the Purdue Institute for Cancer Research. He leads a project to develop patented enzyme inhibitors into treatments for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), the most common type of liver cancer.
“Novel HCC therapeutics are desperately needed,” Mesecar said. “HCC poses significant challenges to public health systems worldwide. Developing new drugs is critical to address various societal needs.”
These needs include rising incidence and mortality rates, limited treatment options, improving patient outcomes, and reducing economic burdens related to current HCC treatments.
“My team and I have developed new, patented compounds that inhibit a human enzyme called USP7 without affecting similar enzymes,” Mesecar said. “Selective USP7 inhibitors are being sought, but few have been developed.
“Our compounds inhibit USP7 via a unique mechanism,” he said. “The proposed drug binding site is located away from the catalytic site, making our compounds selective for USP7 among the other 50-plus USP enzymes in the human cell.”
Mesecar said his goal is to show that the compounds can target HCC cell lines to advance them further toward the clinic.
“The Trask funding will provide resources to design and synthesize a new series of new compounds based on those described in our patents,” he said. “These new compounds will have improved druglike properties and increased potency against different HCC cell lines.”
Pablo Zavattieri, College of Engineering; “Proof of Concept for the Reconfigurable and Navigable Waterway Barrier (RNWB) To Safeguard and Strengthen Maritime Traffic Economics”; $50,000
Zavattieri is the Jerry M. and Lynda T. Engelhardt Professor in Civil Engineering in the Lyles School of Civil and Construction Engineering. He leads a project to create a patent-pending RNWB to address saltwater intrusion in the Panama Canal.
“Climate change, increased water demand from Neopanamax traffic and declining freshwater availability in Gatun Lake have exacerbated the problem,” Zavattieri said. “These challenges threaten both human consumption of water and the number of daily transits in the canal, reducing revenue.”
Zavattieri’s system uses advanced materials developed at Purdue, preventing water mixing during ship passage and preserving freshwater resources while supporting local trade.
“The Panama Canal Authority (ACP) has expressed strong interest in our technology, noting its potential to enhance freshwater management and improve canal capacity,” Zavattieri said. “This technology could free up the water equivalent of additional ship transits per day, generating annual revenue while maintaining operational efficiency.”
Zavattieri said a critical connection to the ACP has been Purdue alumnus Luis Alfaro, former vice president of the ACP. He said Alfaro’s involvement has helped bridge Purdue research and Panamanian infrastructure priorities.
“Thanks to his support and vision, we were able to initiate direct engagement with ACP leadership,” Zavattieri said. “This led to an in-person visit where co-inventor Nelson Pachao and I presented the RNWB concept, laying the foundation for future collaboration.”
Zavattieri said the Trask award will fund a six-month project to advance the RNWB by refining its design, fabricating a proof of concept and conducting controlled tests at Purdue.
“In discussions with ACP, we have explored potential business models for a startup company to participate in this economic opportunity, ensuring that investors see a viable path to monetization through licensing or service agreements,” he said. “Successfully addressing these challenges will strengthen Purdue’s historic collaboration with Panama, reinforce its leadership in waterway solutions, attract investment and expand global impact by tackling salt intrusion in critical waterways worldwide.”
The importance of the Trask Innovation Fund
Matt Dressler, Purdue Innovates Incubator’s funds manager, said the Trask Innovation Fund supports Purdue researchers through the “valley of death.”
“It sometimes takes years for an innovation to move from laboratory creation to marketplace product,” he said. “Purdue innovators face challenges during this time, including technology obsolescence and frustration due to lack of progress.”
Trask funding can address those challenges, complementing other Purdue Innovates resources provided to inventors and entrepreneurs.
“Previous Trask recipients have used the funding to conduct tests, generate data, develop prototypes and support students,” Dressler said. “This additional level of validation of the research makes it more attractive to companies that want to license it and bring it to the marketplace.”
About Purdue Innovates Incubator
Purdue Innovates Incubator is the front door to the rich ecosystem of programs and services designed to help early-stage startups take their next step. Programs provide settings for cohort work and one-on-one consultations. Content includes clarifying problems from the customer’s perspective, developing a business model, conducting customer discovery interviews, team building, determining regulatory pathways and legal structures, and more. Purdue alumni and community members interested in becoming mentors are invited to contact the Incubator team.
About Purdue University
Purdue University is a public research university leading with excellence at scale. Ranked among top 10 public universities in the United States, Purdue discovers, disseminates and deploys knowledge with a quality and at a scale second to none. More than 107,000 students study at Purdue across multiple campuses, locations and modalities, including more than 58,000 at our main campus in West Lafayette and Indianapolis. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 14 years in a row. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap — including its comprehensive urban expansion, the Mitch Daniels School of Business, Purdue Computes and the One Health initiative — at https://www.purdue.edu/president/strategic-initiatives.

Attachments

Steve Martin
Purdue Research Foundation
sgmartin@prf.org

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