A new public-private effort aimed at strengthening the U.S. “innovation ecosystem” seeks to leverage promising technologies emerging from university labs so that they can quickly be turned into products.

The Innovation Corps is the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) response to growing economic pressures to find new ways to leverage investments in basic research in science and engineering. NSF Director Subra Suresh spearheaded the launch of the “I-Corps” last July. Suresh is the former dean of engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a hotbed for technology spinoffs.

Twenty one teams were selected last October for the first round of I-Corps funding. They received relatively modest $50,000 awards to begin assessing the commercial prospects of their technology concepts. Program managers said they are preparing to select individual projects that would bring together researchers and entrepreneurs to find new ways to transform emerging technologies into viable commercial products.

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