A Salute to Faculty Inventors

Photo by Matt Reynolds

University of Arkansas faculty honored at the Inventors Appreciation Banquet Wednesday included Jia Di (front row, from left), Marty Matlock, Xianghong Qian, Ranil Wickramasinghe, Ingrid Fristch, Ralph Henry, Scott Osborn and Hameed Naseem. Congratulating the inventors were University of Arkansas System President Donald R. Bobbitt (back row, from left), U of A Chancellor Joe Steinmetz and U of A Provost Ashok Saxena.

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – The University of Arkansas honored seven faculty inventors on Wednesday, March 30 at the fourth annual Inventors Appreciation Banquet.

The event, held at the Innovation Center at the Arkansas Research and Technology Park, saluted the accomplishments of inventors who have been issued recent patents. They were initiated into the National Academy of Inventors, a nonprofit organization that accepted the University of Arkansas as a charter member in 2012.

The academy endorses investigators at universities and non-profit research institutes who translate their research findings into inventions that benefit society.

Technology Ventures – the Fayetteville campus’ technology licensing office – hosted the banquet.

Faculty who were initiated into the academy were:

• Marty Matlock, professor, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering. Matlock also holds an appointment with the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture.
• Scott Osborn, associate professor, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering. Osborn also holds an appointment with the Division of Agriculture.
• Xianghong Qian, associate professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering
• Ranil Wickramasinghe, professor and Ross E. Martin Chair in Emerging Technologies, Department of Chemical Engineering

Also honored were faculty members of the National Academy of Inventors who were awarded patents in the last year:

• Jia Di, professor and Twenty-First Century Research Leadership Chair, Department of Computer Science and Computer Engineering

• Ralph Henry, Distinguished Professor and W.M. Keck Professor, Department of Biological Sciences
• Hameed Naseem, professor, Department of Electrical Engineering

Matlock and Osborn founded BlueInGreen, a water-quality management company affiliated with the U of A, in 2004. They have since been awarded patents for a system and method of dissolving gases in fluids and for delivering dissolved gases to improve the quality of drinking water and wastewater.

Wickramasinghe, an Arkansas Research Alliance scholar, and Qian have been awarded a patent for magnetically responsive membranes that provide superior performance for applications such as treating wastewaters.

Di was awarded two patents in 2015 for designing advanced low-power integrated circuits that can function in battery-powered devices.

Henry was awarded a patent in 2015 for the invention of a protein that binds specifically to methamphetamine. The patent is licensed to InterveXion, a Little Rock-based company Henry co-founded with researchers at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. InterveXion is developing the antibody as a therapy to treat methamphetamine addiction.

Naseem was awarded a patent in 2015 for a process to turn amorphous silicon into a high-quality crystal silicon for solar and LCD applications.