OAK RIDGE, Tenn. — An East Tennessee research partnership is hoping to help make the University of Tennessee and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory leaders in two specific areas — bioeconomy systems and radiopharmaceutical therapies.
The UT-Oak Ridge Innovation Institute announced it would give $20 million to support each initiative, identifying them as Convergent Research Initiatives. Randy Boyd, the UT System President, said in a release that they are expected to bring together more than 100 UT and ORNL researchers across the state.
The two initiatives were chosen out of 54 proposals submitted by research teams.
“There was an outstanding response to the call for proposals from ORNL and UT researchers,” said David Sholl in a release, UT-ORII’s interim executive director. “We had 54 teams of ORNL and UT researchers come together and say, ‘We have a big idea. We’re ready to work together.’"
The bioeconomy systems research team is expected to create a circular testbed by partnering with auto manufacturing and agriculture/forestry groups. It hopes to use new techniques to make materials from sustainable sources, helping shift agriculture and manufacturing industries towards low-energy and more sustainable circular techniques.
The team focusing on radiopharmaceutical therapies will work to develop the next advancement in precision cancer medicine, focusing research on a new generation of theranostics. This technique uses radiotracers, specially made to bind to specific targets in the body, to diagnose and treat cancer.
The research team is expected to use theranostics designed to precisely kill cancer cells with few side effects, while also creating an education and workforce framework to attract new radiopharmaceutical companies to the state.
