TECH OFFERS

This technology offer is an Intelligent IoT Vertical Farming system, which is designed to be 4-tiered and mobile, for either indoor or outdoor farming. It uses a hydroponic system that grows plants by enhancing the photosynthetic process.  Since the system does not use soil, it is cleaner and more hygienic. FDA-approved and organic mineral nutrients are used for the hydroponic growing.  Compared to traditional agriculture, the vertical farming implementation saves more than 90 percent land area needed, while harvesting 80 percent more per unit area. Furthermore, with the water recycling design, the system achieves a reduction of 70 to 85 percent water usage.  The set-up therefore, promotes the “Go Green” initiative and contributes towards Singapore’s effort to reduce our carbon footprint.  In summary, the following is achieved: More than 90% land savings with more than 80% physical spaces unlocked. 70-85% water savings. Reduced wastages of fertilizers and nutrients.

Indium tin oxide (ITO) has been widely used as a transparent electrode, but it is not able to meet the recent requirements from various applications for lower resistance. Metal mesh has been developed as an alternative, but there is a trade-off between lower resistance and finer wiring lines, because when large size is required, transmissivity has to be sacrificed by the increased line width to lower the resistance.   This technology offer is a unique metal mesh-based transparent conductive film with high aspect ratio wiring, which enables lower resistance and high transmissivity at the same time. It also has very high planarity of the film surface, ensuring stable performance and quality when used as a transparent electrode for thin film applications. These advantages were realised by a unique roll-to-roll manufacturing process.

Agarwood (Aquilaria malaccensis) is a fragrant dark resinous wood used in the production of oud oil through distillation. Agarwood and its by-products are associated with many cultures and religious purposes in Middle East, China, Japan, India, etc. They are widely used to produce incense, perfume, medicine, TCM medicine, teas, complimentary health products and more. This technology offer encompasses a distillation process that provides the highest quality of oud oil in terms of purity and density from agarwood. The technology owner is interested to do R&D collaboration and co-development activities with partners from various application fields, e.g., the development of novel complementary health products containing oud in the areas of wellness, medicinal, cultural, lifestyle, and product innovation relating to its by-products or waste.

Scaffolds and microcarriers are the enabling technologies to support higher cell densities in cultivated meat and seafood development. There are currently different types of microcarriers available for cultivated meat. However, many of these are mostly made of animal-derived materials, non-edible materials or with low surface volume ratio. This technology offer is an edible, 100% plant-based microcarriers and scaffolds. The microcarriers and microbeads allow cells to proliferate and enhance the density of cells within a bioreactor. On the other hand, the scaffolds help those proliferated cells to differentiate as well as provide structure and texture for different cuts of meat. The technology is available for R&D collaboration and IP licensing, with partners that are working in the cultivated meat, seafood and dairy industry.

In a post-pandemic age, there is a heightened concern about the spread of infectious diseases and other pathogens from traditional biometric enrolment and authentication technologies. As such, much of the industry is moving towards contactless operations for an increasing number of functions. Authentication techniques performed through palmprints are invariant to skin colour, height, changes in facial features, masks or hairstyles, and have the added advantage of being universally unique; even between a twins' hands. This technology is an Artificial Intelligence (AI) palmprint identification technology that utilises palm features to recognise an individual. Palm features are well-suited for identification purposes as they remain unchanged for life and are therefore ideal replacements for access and identification cards. The technology is backed by palm print and palm vein recognition algorithms, and contactless image acquisition technology that enables easy, hygienic, rapid identity verification and access control in a post-pandemic environment.

Image annotation is a critical step in developing computer vision and image recognition systems. Image annotation can be used in applications in a spectrum of deep-tech pillars such as Healthcare/Medical (detecting and diagnosing diseases from radiology or pathology images), Manufacturing (defect detection from image scans), Agritech (plant/crop health check via images and photos), and more. As a result, image annotation is critical in developing Artificial Intelligence/ Machine Learning (AI/ML) models in a variety of fields. The role of image annotation in deep learning has changed over time. Today, image annotation has become more important for object recognition with new characteristics and capabilities in real-world settings. However, manual labeling of complex objects continues to be time-consuming, tedious, and error-prone - additionally, outsourcing these labeling tasks might not always be the best way due to domain-expertise required in labeling complex image data e.g. radiography images or surface defects on semiconductors. This technology offer is an AI-assisted image labelling tool that enables technical teams to collaboratively, quickly, and easily label large image datasets with pixel-level accuracy masks. As the tool is industry agnostic, it can be used by any industry with a minimal learning curve. The technology owner is keen to work with companies who are looking to build out datasets / ground-truths / and labels for building deep-learning experiments and capabilities, through R&D collaboration and licensing opportunities.

Drugs delivered orally are often degraded in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract and the liver, lowering their efficacy. Cutaneous drug delivery offers an alternative as it circumvents the GI tract and liver. It can also be advantageous for skin-related diseases such as skin cancers and acne. The key challenge however, is to penetrate the epidermal layers. Several approaches are being developed for cutaneous drug delivery. First, micro-needles deliver drugs by physically disrupting the skin. However, the efficiency is greatly influenced by the physical characteristics of the needles and tissue. Second, liposome-based methods use particles called lipsomes to encapsulate drugs. This requires separate mechanisms, such as sonophoresis, to disrupt the skin and allow drug penetration. The current technology, ForodermTM comprises a painless, low cost and safe bioactive delivery system. The technology owner is interested in licensing and co-development activities in various application fields. 

Inulin-lipid hybrids (ILH) are a class of novel micro-encapsulation technology that affords the ability to encapsulate poorly water soluble drugs within their lipophilic core. The drug-loaded lipid nanoparticles are encapsulated within a three-dimensional solid-state matrix comprised of inulin polysaccharide chains. Owing to the unique bio-activities afforded by inulin (a natural dietary fibre), ILH technology serves as a dry powder drug formulation with wide-ranging applications for improving drug performance. ILH technology can be dosed orally to improve drug bioavailability or systemically to stimulate pH triggered drug release and improve cellular uptake. The technology comprises a dry powder formulation that presents high drug and lipid stability through micro-encapsulation approach. The technology owner is seeking co-development partners and potential licensees interested in this formulation.   

Chronic infections (lungs, wounds, eyes) are typically due to bacterial biofilm infections and are untreatable with commercially available antibiotics. In up to 80% of patients with Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection, there will be no response to antibiotics. Currently for P. aeruginosa, aminoglycoside and colistin are mainstay therapy. Therapy can be lifelong with the goal of keeping the infection at bay, not focused on eradication. New formulation techniques are focusing on liposomal formulations; however, these formulations have stability, manufacturing and effectivity issues that are restricting their entry into the market. The technology comprises a novel formulation approach that direct antibiotics into biofilm (chronic) infections, enhancing the efficacy of cationic antimicrobials by at least 100-fold against biofilm bacterial infections. The technology owner is seeking licencing, co-development opportunities as well as contract research partnership with parties interested in this novel antimicrobial formulation.