What changed?
The Impacts and Benefits
Impacts for the Company
Through the partnership, the company have benefitted in a number of areas which have directly attributed to the successful development of AurTex. As a business, RUA specialise in implantable medical textiles, but this is the first time the business has looked to develop a composite material combining textile with their proprietary Elast-Eon™ polymer.
Having access to expert, technical knowledge within the Academic team has proven invaluable through the development process, allowing greater understanding of AurTex as a material. The collaboration has been key to supporting the identification of critical parameters and developing appropriate test methods to enable material characterisation and modelling, as well as increasing the understanding of how material processing could impact manufacturing process and final product design specifications.
The partnership has also provided the company with access to laboratories within the university campus; this will continue after the partnership comes to an end, via the visiting researcher scheme.
Impacts for the Academic Team
The partnership with a company with an internationally-recognised market position in biomedical devices has further enhanced the credibility of the University's strategic vision to be A Place of Useful Learning, and to support the application of its research expertise to issues of commercial, industrial and societal importance. It provided an opportunity for the Academic Team to apply their technical skills to structurally complex materials. Identifying the combination of parameters affecting its processing and end-use application of the AurTex materials has been a scientific challenge in its own right, with the additional challenging constraint of working to commercial and regulatory realities.
The project led to the creation of new inter-departmental academic collaboration between Dr Oliveira and Prof Liggat, and this new working relationship has since yielded a new funded PhD position.
Two company-sponsored UG student projects were run, one in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and one in Pure and Applied Chemistry, with the latter subsequently enrolling in a PhD at the University.
Impacts for the KTP Associate
Both Associates in this 2-Associate project benefited significantly. They gained insight into the medical device industry particularly relating to the design process. They also gained significant knowledge of both native heart valves and prosthetic devices, from the perspective of engineers and designers as well as surgeons and the wider medical device industry. They also learned about various textile manufacturing techniques and the uses of medical textiles in devices.
Through the research undertaken they expanded their skills and expertise regarding numerous aspects of material testing, both physical and chemical, and the modelling of complex hyperelastic materials.
The training opportunities, including the KTP modules and courses in project management, provided significant benefits to the Associates that will be invaluable to their ongoing careers.