A SCOTS university received recognition in two national award ceremonies for innovation in health and life sciences on Thursday.
The University of Dundee’s Professor Sir Mike Ferguson and Dr Luigi Manfredi from Dundee’s School of Medicine both won.
Professor Ferguson was named Scotland’s Knowledge Exchange Champion of the Year at the Scottish Knowledge Exchange Awards in Glasgow.
The award cited his transformational impact on life sciences in Scotland over at least two decades.
He was involved in forming the university’s Drug Discovery Unit resulting in at least eight spin-out companies and championing the creation of a Life Sciences Innovation District in Dundee.
Professor Ferguson’s work seeks to transform world-leading science into new drugs and therapies that benefit patients worldwide.
Scotland’s Life Sciences Awards presented Dr Luigi Manfredi with an award for Innovation – Health Technology for his work with the Softech Robotics project.
Dr David McBeth, the University’s Vice-Principal (Enterprise and Economic Transformation), said: “These awards for leading Dundee researchers reflect the University’s ongoing success in translating internationally-leading, high quality research into transformational impacts.
“These impacts encompass better diagnosis and treatment of disease for the benefit of patients and health services worldwide, and positive economic impacts both for the city of Dundee and for the companies we partner with in our research.”
The project allows a new approach to colonoscopies (a procedure used to internally inspect the colon for signs of bowel cancer and other serious health conditions).
The University of Dundee said 33m colonoscopies are done each year across Europe and the USA with some using 1960s technology.
Softech aims to improve the patient experience as well as to lighten the amount of procedures on health services and staff.
McBeth added: “At the personal level, Mike and Luigi have both more than earned this recognition.
“The University also had staff, projects and spin-out companies shortlisted in other categories across the two awards ceremonies yesterday, illustrating the quality and strength of our offerings across Knowledge Exchange more broadly.”
