Ohio State collaborates with not-for-profit to develop technology for neurological disorders

In partnership with Battelle, a science and technology nonprofit organization, Ohio State will help launch the NeuroTech Institute to develop new treatments for patients with neurological disorders. Credit: Katherine Simon | Lantern Reporter

Ohio State and Battelle, a science and technology not-for-profit organization, have partnered to help launch the NeuroTech Institute to develop new treatments for patients with neurological disorders. 

Dr. Tim Lucas, CEO of NTI and professor of neurological surgery at Ohio State, said the NTI — an independent nonprofit with the goal of creating new technology in neuroscience and delivering it to patients quickly— will try to create treatments for neurological diseases within its three pillars: cyberphysical solutions, cell modulation solutions and network of the mind. 

“The United Nations estimates that one in six of the world’s population is directly diagnosed with a neurological disease,” Lucas said. “If you add their first-degree relatives, you’re talking about over half of the world’s population.” 

Lucas said the cyberphysical solutions pillar will focus on restoring normal communication between the brain and the body using implantable or wearable devices.

“We can link devices that people wear or have on the body that restore real-time communication going back and forth between the brain,” Lucas said. 

For the second pillar of cell modulation solutions, NTI will try to create solutions for monogenic disorders — where a single gene is abnormal, causing neurological symptoms, Lucas said. 

The final pillar, the network of the mind, deals with connection disorders within the brain itself. Lucas said NTI will diagnose and map the brain to identify where the bad connections are coming from in order to go in and intervene. 

Lucas said NTI’s business plan is modeled after the Broad Institute of Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University. He said the plan questioned how mapping the human genome — set of human DNA — could help patients in hospitals and clinics.

“They knew that the university wasn’t the best situated to do that, even a fantastic university like MIT, so they created the nonprofit,” Lucas said. “That nonprofit business structure took scientists and embedded them in this open, collaborative environment where they could solve problems in a very open format, not competing with each other for grants or papers, but in a very collaborative environment.”

Lucas said with this business model, new technologies developed are spun off into separate companies that raise money to get through the process of clinical trials with the FDA. After the technology shows efficacy in the trials, it can be distributed to patients. 

“Universities are perfectly designed for discovery and deep science. That’s what universities are created to do,” Lucas said. “In the business world — in the business of healthcare — patients need technologies and treatments to be accessible to them in the hospital and in the clinic.” 

Heather Sever, chief operating officer of NTI, said Ohio State’s knowledge and breadth of research, combined with Battelle’s record of turning knowledge and research into innovation, make the two great partners to help start NTI. 

Sever said NTI has raised over $28 million, mostly from Ohio State and Battelle.

“With their funding, we’ll be up, and we’ll be fully running,” Sever said. “We’ll continue to fundraise throughout the entirety of NTI, just to have the funds to be able to touch as many lives and help as many people as we can.” 

Sever said NTI will be housed in the Interdisciplinary Research Facility, which is currently under construction. She said it expects to move into the building in May or June 2023.

Lucas said the university and Battelle will receive royalties from any technologies licensed or sold from NTI.  

“We are going to be sure that they realize a return on their investment and the way that that return is realized is that both of the parents share some of the commercial proceeds of the technology that we make,” Lucas said. 

Sever said NTI will begin with a group of about 12 scientists and engineers but hopes to expand.

“Our hope is that in five years’ time, we have a group of about 60 scientists and engineers, we have a track record of success bringing new treatments to patients and we really are the pinnacle of medical technology for the United States,” Lucas said.

This story was updated at 3:20 p.m. Tuesday.