HOUSTON, Texas (June 8, 2026)—A startup company built on a new therapeutic created at the University of Nebraska Medical Center’s College of Pharmacy recently announced the close of a $6.5 million funding round.

The successful seed round of investment will allow Goldenrod Therapeutics, Inc., to complete the studies required for pursuing clinical trials in 2027, according to a company press release issued last week.

Goldenrod Therapeutics is a drug development startup focused on treating brain inflammation common in several debilitating and degenerative neurological conditions. Their core technology is called “11h,” a molecule that UNMC chemist Corey Hopkins, PhD, developed to inhibit a natural protein called PDE4 or phosphodiesterase 4.

“It is exciting and gratifying to see your work possibly improve someone’s life,” Dr. Hopkins said. “For 11h, its progress means a lot because of all the effort put in by students and postdocs over the years. So, it’s fantastic that their hard work is getting closer to actually helping patients.”

From left are University of Nebraska President Jeffrey Gold, MD, Corey Hopkins, PhD, and UNeMed President and CEO, Michael Dixon, PhD. Dr. Hopkins’ PDE4B Selective Inhibitors was named UNeMed’s Most Promising New Invention of the year during the 2019 Innovation Awards ceremony on Thursday, Oct. 17.

UNMC’s technology transfer and commercialization office, UNeMed, helped establish Goldenrod in 2023. UNeMed also created the licensing framework for the technology’s use and development.

“Drug discovery is some of the most important work we do at UNMC, and investors place real value on new molecules and discoveries,” UNeMed’s President and CEO, Michael Dixon, PhD, said. “A raise like this shows what our science is worth, and the Center for Drug Design and Innovation is at the heart of that effort. As our research enterprise grows, continued investment in drug discovery and development will be critical to our success creating and developing new therapeutics.”

PDE4 is involved in several inflammatory diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, and central nervous system diseases that include drug addiction, schizophrenia and neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s, Multiple Sclerosis, ALS, and Batten Disease.

Goldenrod will initially focus on Friedreich’s Ataxia as the company moves toward regulatory approval. Friedreich’s Ataxia is a rare, progressive neurodegenerative genetic disorder that typically begins in childhood or adolescence. The disease causes progressive nerve damage, spinal deformities, impaired coordination and balance, and can lead to vision and hearing loss. Although treatment options remain limited, the condition is incurable, and many individuals require the use of a wheelchair within 10-20 years of symptom onset.

“One of the things I love most about drug discovery is that you never know where a promising molecule might end up helping the most,” Dr. Hopkins said. “This condition desperately needs new treatments, so it’s amazing to be closing that gap.”

Existing medications targeting PDE4 carry with them severe side-effects—like nausea and vomiting—and have poor uptake into the central nervous system.

Dr. Hopkins’ new compound reduced the potential for adverse side-effects while showing dramatic improvement in brain uptake.

“This is what world-class drug discovery looks like, and it is happening right here at UNMC,” Dr. Dixon said. “Dr. Hopkins and his team have designed a molecule that overcomes a problem the pharmaceutical industry wrestled with for decades, and now a company has the capital to carry it into the clinic.”

The successful round was led by Ataxia Ventures and an affiliate of Fannin Partners.

“The scientific foundation established at [UNMC] and Fannin has positioned 11h as a potentially important advancement in CNS-targeted PDE4 inhibition,” said Tom Hamilton of Ataxia Ventures, “…with potential relevance across a broader range of diseases.”

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Precision Syringe CEO Adrian Blake demonstrates his company’s patented syringe design to a guest during the May 28, 2026, Idea Pub: Morning Edition. The syringe was invented at UNMC.

OMAHA, Nebraska (May 28, 2026)—Adrian Blake, CEO of Precision Syringe, led Thursday’s Idea Pub: Morning Edition with an entertaining look at his journey in the Omaha startup world and a peek at what is still to come.

Precision Syringe was founded on an innovation created by former UNMC pediatric ophthalmologist Danny Suh, MD, who wanted more control when injecting children’s eyes with medication.

The Precision Syringe isn’t for flu shots, Blake said, but for incredibly delicate procedures where the smallest movements could be catastrophic, such as retinal injections.

Blake added that Precision Syringe expects to submit for FDA approval later this year, and soon-after will begin its Series A financing round.

Blake’s presentation was primed with five key lessons learned for other young startups and entrepreneurs.

He noted the importance of the “fit” between a founder and the desired market; understanding the complexity of the regulatory process as early as possible; leveraging existing networks; maintaining honesty about the product; and the “UNMC spinout cascade is real.”

Morning Edition is UNeMed’s and UNeTech Institute’s networking event for university innovators, entrepreneurs and startup community members. Catalyst Omaha co-sponsors the event and provides free tours of the spacious facility.

Morning Editions will continue to be a fixture in the Forge Event Hall, located on the north end of Catalyst Omaha in the EDGE District. Guided tours will also continue as an added feature.

The next Morning Edition is planned for Thursday, June 25, 2026, at 9-11 a.m.

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OMAHA, Nebraska (May 22, 2026)—The University of Nebraska has introduced “Innovation by Nebraska,” a commercialization co-branding program designed for companies developing products born at the University of Nebraska, UNeMed announced today.

The program allows licensed companies to display an exclusive “Innovation by” mark, followed by the logo of the campus where the innovation originated. Distinct logos are available for each of the University of Nebraska’s four campuses, and additional variants are also available for innovations developed in cross-campus collaborations.

For innovations and technologies licensed through UNeMed, the “Innovation by” mark will include the UNMC shield or the University of Nebraska at Omaha “O.”

Visit UNeMed’s “Innovation by” webpage to learn more about the program, including how to participate.

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UNeTech’s Joe Runge (left) chats with UNeMed’s Jason Nickla during the Nov. 20, 2025, installment of the popular networking event Idea Pub: Morning Edition.

by Michael Dixon, UNeMed & Joe Runge, UNeTech | May 21, 2026

UNeMed Corporation and the UNeTech Institute have announced plans to share office space, a development that reflects the natural evolution of a working relationship that has grown steadily in the last eight years.

The two organizations are both rooted in the University of Nebraska’s innovation ecosystem, and their work fits together by design.

UNeMed manages the intellectual property coming out of UNMC and UNO labs and helps entrepreneurs to form new companies built on that research.

UNeTech then helps those entrepreneurs and young companies do the unglamorous work of becoming real businesses–refining the commercial thesis, finding early customers, recruiting operators, and getting in front of investors.

Sharing a physical space is a practical extension of a partnership that has been running this way for years.

Building on What’s Already There

The shared space will allow both organizations to deepen their involvement in joint efforts already underway. Chief among them is the Steel Works Health Accelerator, a 16-week program launched earlier this year in partnership with CQuence Health. Housed in Omaha’s Catalyst building in the EDGE District, Steel Works is designed to help health-focused startups develop investment-ready companies. Steel Works provides structured mentorship, training and a support network in areas like commercialization pathways, capital planning, and investor preparation.

Steel Works is the most visible piece of joint programming, but the day-to-day collaboration runs deeper. New ventures spun out of UNMC and UNO research move from UNeMed’s licensing and company-formation work into UNeTech’s hands-on operational support, and most of the active startup portfolio touches both organizations at different stages.

RespirAI’s recent launch of its mobile app, RespiVera, and Impower Health’s recent pilot studies are two current examples. Both companies trace back to UNMC and UNO research, were structured and launched through UNeMed, and have leaned on UNeTech for the operational scaffolding that turns a license into a functioning company.

The same pattern is playing out across the broader portfolio.

Programs Continue. Coordination Improves

UNeMed and UNeTech will continue operating the programs their respective communities have come to rely on. UNeMed’s Idea Pub: Morning Edition, Innovation Week, and technology transfer services will remain in place. UNeTech’s business development support, entrepreneurship programming, and portfolio work will continue without interruption.

What changes is the opportunity for broader coordination—sharing information earlier, identifying overlapping needs sooner, and reducing duplication where possible. The two organizations have been doing this work side-by-side for years. Now they get to do it in the same building.

The move also positions both organizations to play a more active role in the Catalyst building and the broader EDGE District. Catalyst represents a generational investment in Omaha’s innovation infrastructure, and UNeMed and UNeTech are actively developing programming to make sure that investment pays off for the region. Both organizations have been present in the district since Catalyst’s opening, hosting events, supporting startups, and connecting university innovators with the community.

Sharing an office makes that presence more consistent and more useful. Nebraska has built something real on the western edge of the UNMC campus.

UNeMed and UNeTech will continue to make sure it thrives.

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OMAHA, Nebraska (May 20, 2026)—Open Range and Techstars Omaha are hosting Startup Weekend at Catalyst Omaha in the EDGE District on June 5-7, and any “startup-curious” faculty, staff or students at the University of Nebraska are encouraged to participate.

Startup Weekend is a three-day immersive experience where participants build something from scratch alongside a room full of curious, motivated people. Some arrive with ideas ready to pitch. Others show up to help bring those ideas to life. Everyone leaves with something real.

The event is ideal for UNMC and UNO faculty, staff, and students who have thought about launching a venture, solving a problem, or simply curious to explore what entrepreneurship feels like in practice. No business experience is required, just curiosity and a willingness to collaborate.

Startup Weekend is designed for:

• Existing and aspiring founders
• Designers and marketers
• Developers and builders
• Students and career switchers

The event takes place at Catalyst Omaha, 4601 Catalyst Court, with the following schedule:

• Friday, June 5 (5:30 p.m.-10 p.m.)
• Saturday, June 6 (7 a.m.-10 p.m.)
• Sunday, June 7 (7 a.m.-4:30 p.m.)

Ticket holders receive access to skilled builders, innovative minds, and expert mentors — plus food, coffee, and swag throughout the weekend. Student tickets are $50 and early bird tickets are $75. Early bird pricing ends Friday, May 22 at 11:59 p.m.

Register at openrange.org/startup-weekend.

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OMAHA, Nebraska (May 18, 2026)—Idea Pub: Morning Edition will return to its regular schedule and format with Precision Syringe CEO Adrian Blake tabbed as the featured speaker.

The event will be Thursday, May 28, at 9-11 a.m. in the Forge Event Hall of the EDGE District’s Catalyst building.

Blake is expected to deliver an update on his company’s progress, which has been preparing to clear the FDA and launch a product that began as a UNMC innovation. The innovation is a one-handed syringe invented by a former pediatric ophthalmologist who wanted more precision and agility when injecting medications into his patients’ eyes.

Free refreshments will be provided courtesy Arbor Bank, and Catalyst will offer complimentary facility tours on a first-come, first-served basis.

Park Omaha manages metered parking in a structure just north of the main entrance and along 46th and 48th Streets. See map for directions and more details.

UNeMed, the technology transfer and commercialization office for UNMC and UNO, created Morning Edition to help University innovators and entrepreneurs connect and collaborate with colleagues and experts from the venture capital and startup communities.

Morning Edition regularly features “Office Hours” with UNeMed staff, co-sponsor UNeTech Institute, CQuence Health, and MOVE Venture Capital. Office Hours creates the opportunity for faculty, students and staff to have one-on-one time with UNeMed, UNeTech, CQuence or MOVE professionals to discuss new technologies or startup potential.

UNeTech is the University of Nebraska’s startup incubator, supporting entrepreneurial efforts built on innovations created by University personnel. CQuence is a local venture organization focused on healthcare-related startups. MOVE is a pre-seed and seed venture capital firm focused on investing in Nebraska technology startup companies.

Morning Edition is typically held on the final Thursday of every month and will continue to feature guest speakers from the University’s stable of successful and budding startup companies and from Omaha’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. The event will provide UNMC and UNO innovators an opportunity to build new partnerships and allies that can help develop their innovative ideas and discoveries into products that help people.

A tentative list of upcoming Morning Editions include:

• June 25: Andrew Rogers, CEO, Docology
• July 30: Jon Rhoades, CEO, Valid
• Aug 27: Jonell Tempero, Managing Dir, US Operations, RespirAI
• Sept 24: Jenilee Woltman, MS Ed, CEO, Mission Accomplished
• Oct 29: Riley Reynolds, MS, CEO, Rheam Medical
• Nov 19: Stephen Gliske, PhD, Co-Founder, NeuroServ
• Dec 17: Jessica Queen, RN, CEO, Omedus

The event is free and open to all, and complimentary refreshments will be provided as long as supplies last.

Morning Edition is part of UNeMed’s “Idea Pub,” a suite of entrepreneurial networking events that include “Innovations & Libations” and “Startup Showcase.”

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OMAHA, Nebraska (May 14, 2026)—The annual Technology Transfer Boot Camp will be held Aug. 10-14, UNeMed announced today.

The Technology Transfer Boot Camp is aimed at scientists and students interested in the process of commercializing an academic innovation or discovery. The week-long series of seminars and hands-on training can help jump-start an alternate career in science as a technology transfer professional.

The program helps scientists gain a wide range of skills and experience to match their scientific knowledge and training.

The Boot Camp focuses on several key areas relevant to a successful career in technology transfer, including:

• Invention evaluation
• Intellectual property law
• Marketing and commercialization
• Contract negotiation

UNeMed’s 2026 Technology Transfer Boot Camp will dive deeper than simple lectures. Topics will be explored with hands-on activities meant to teach new skills and abilities.

Anyone within the University of Nebraska system is encouraged to apply and participate free of charge, but space is limited. All sessions will be held at UNeMed in the new Catalyst building, on the west side of Saddle Creek Road.

Applications are open through July 10, and will be reviewed in the order they are received until all spaces are filled.

To apply, follow this link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSf5j7HSF6qfRnqS6VUlp1L5QvrcXIM1asPq36fxlnGp1mkrAQ/viewform?usp=sf_link.

More information about the application process and requirements can be found at https://www.unemed.com/about-us/join-our-team#bootcamp.

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UNeMed Business Development Manager and Morning Edition organizer Tyler Scherr, PhD, addresses the gathering during brief welcoming remarks at the April 30, 2026, installment of Idea Pub: Morning Edition in the Forge Event Hall at Catalyst Omaha in the Edge District.

OMAHA, Nebraska (April 30, 2026)—Idea Pub: Morning Edition underwent a temporary program shift today, delivering a full slate of early-stage Nebraska startups, including a handful that have reached the midpoint of the Steel Works Health Accelerator program.

For the first time, the networking event was held in the afternoon and provided space and audience for five health-related startups, all of which are built around University of Nebraska inventions.

“It should be obvious—hopefully obvious to everyone in this room, at least—that the University drives innovation,” event organizer and UNeMed Business Development Manager, Tyler Scherr, PhD, said during opening remarks.

What soon followed was an array of five early-stage Nebraska startup companies built around home-grown novel solutions. They included more effective diagnostic platforms and devices, better-training for cariologists, more streamlined medical prescription processes, and a potentially significant improvement to surgical safety.

Three members of the Steel Works Health Accelerator’s inaugural cohort—Aprendo Cardiovascular Solutions, Deep Health Diagnostics and BreezeMed—were among the five who delivered 10-minute presentations. (Steel Works is a three-month program that trains, supports and mentors early-stage startup companies built around emerging University of Nebraska innovations.)

RespirAI and Rheam Medical also delivered updates about their companies.

Ed O’Leary, MD, an interventional cardiologist and CEO of Aprendo Cardiovascular Solutions, discusses his innovative approach to training better cardiologists during his presentation at the April 30, 2026, installment of Idea Pub: Morning Edition in the Forge Event Hall at Catalyst Omaha in the Edge District.

Aprendo, founded by interventional cardiologist Ed O’Leary, MD, is building a better way to teach the intricacies of navigating a catheter to and around a patient’s heart.

“They struggle to learn this,” he said. “It’s a very complex thing to learn because they’re using a two-dimensional image of a three-dimensional object.”

Dr. O’Leary said his solution helps render the heart and its complex of twisting arteries and veins into a three-dimensional model that speeds the training process. At the same time, it also makes the training more effective by using proven concepts often found in video games.

Deep Health Diagnostics, led by ophthalmologists Ron Krueger, MD, and Ashok Puri, MBBS, is working on a software package that leverages the power of AI. Their diagnostic system promises to standardize the diagnosis of the world’s leading case of vision loss, macular edema. Current approaches are too often subject to a doctor’s interpretation and then treated in a one-size-fits-all approach.

Deep Health Diagnostics’ platform could help clinical providers use more objective data for more specific—and earlier—diagnoses. Such an early and specific diagnosis could then help a doctor tailor a treatment program that could dramatically improve a patient’s long-term vision health.

UNMC psychologist Stephen Salzbrenner, MD, opened his presentation for BreezMed with a powerful story about a patient going through a life-threatening mental crisis. After prescribing the patient with potentially life-saving medication, he learned too late the patient’s insurance provider ultimately denied the prescription at the pharmacy for lack of “prior authorization.” Dr. Salzbrenner said he never saw the patient again and still doesn’t know what became of them.

He vowed to do all he could to make certain that wouldn’t happen again. He founded BreezMed, a software solution that helps clinicians and patients avoid the hurdles and roadblocks associated with health insurance and their prior authorization denials.

RespirAI’s Managing Director for U.S. Operations, Jonell Tempero, presented her company’s approach to reducing the deadly effects of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or COPD. The fifth leading cause of death in the U.S., lower raspatory diseases are most dangerous during a sudden flare up of symptoms called an exacerbation.

Predicting those flare ups have been impossible until a logarithm developed by RespirAI empowers wearable devices—such as a sticky patch about the size of a playing card or even a smartwatch—with the ability to seek treatment several hours, or even days, before the flare-up begins.

Rheam Medical’s CEO and founder Riley Reynolds closed out the presentations. Based in Lincoln, Rheam is building a surgical device aimed at preventing a common complication associated with minimally invasive surgery in the lower abdomen.

The first step involves the surgeon piercing the patient’s skin, muscle and tissue to insert a device called a trocar. The trocar serves as a portal through which the surgeon can safely insert various tools, cameras and other instruments. The problem, Reynolds said, is that about 170 patients each day suffer from complications resulting from a surgeon inadvertently puncturing an organ during this initial step.

Riley Reynolds, CEO and founder of Rheam Medical, explains how his company plans to improve minimally invasive procedures during his presentation at the networking event, Idea Pub: Morning Edition, held in the Forge Event Hall at Catalyst Omaha in the Edge District on April 30, 2026.

Reynolds, a mechanical engineer, said Rheam’s device and trocar system all but removes that complication as a possibility.

Morning Edition is UNeMed’s and UNeTech Institute’s networking event for university innovators, entrepreneurs and startup community members. Catalyst Omaha co-sponsors the event and provides free tours of the spacious facility.

Additional sponsors include biomedical investment and mentoring firm CQuence Health and Arbor Bank, which provides coffee and doughnuts to guests.

Morning Edition will continue to be a fixture in the Forge Event Hall, located on the north end of Catalyst Omaha in the Edge District. Guided tours, coffee and doughnuts will also continue as added features.

The next Idea Pub: Morning Edition will be held Thursday, May 28, 2026, at 9 a.m. The featured speaker is expected to be Adrian Blake, CEO at Precision Syringe, a startup built on an innovative design created at UNMC.

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OMAHA, Nebraska (April 28, 2026)—In a break from tradition, the next Idea Pub: Morning Edition will shift to a Startup Showcase format and move to an afternoon showing for its next event on Thursday.

Starting at 1 p.m. in the Forge Event Hall of the Edge District’s Catalyst building, Idea Pub will showcase five startups from the first cohort of the Steel Works Health Accelerator. It is also listed among the “pre-summit” activities for the upcoming Gr8er Plains Summit.

Idea Pub will open with brief remarks highlighting university innovations from co-sponsors UNeMed and UNeTech, who also collaborated to build the Steel Works Health Accelerator.

Steel Works is focused on helping early-stage startups and founders working with “healthtech” innovations from the University and the greater Nebraska community. In collaboration with the health venture company CQuence Health, Steel Works mentors and advises a small cohort of startups as they work to build their investor networks, business models and company messaging.

As Steel Works passes the midpoint with its first cohort, five companies will present improved pitches and provide updates on their progress.

Those startups, in presentation order, are:

• Aprendo Cardiovascular Solutions (Ed O’Leary, MD, CEO)
• Deep Health Diagnostics (Ron Krueger, MD, CEO)
• BreezMed (Chris Henkenius, CEO)
• RespirAI (Jonell Tempero, Managing Director, US Operations)
• Rheam Medical (Riley Reynolds, CEO)

Startup presentations are expected to begin at about 1:20 p.m. Each will run about 10 minutes, with another 5 minutes allotted for Q&A. The event will wrap up at about 2:45 p.m.

Catalyst, a co-sponsor of the event, will offer complimentary facility tours on a first-come, first-served basis.

Park Omaha manages metered parking in a structure just north of the main entrance and along 46th and 48th Streets. See map for directions and more details.

UNeMed, the technology transfer and commercialization office for UNMC and UNO, created Morning Edition to help University innovators and entrepreneurs connect and collaborate with colleagues and experts from the venture capital and startup communities.

Morning Edition regularly features “Office Hours” with UNeMed staff, co-sponsor UNeTech Institute, CQuence Health, and MOVE Venture Capital. Office Hours creates the opportunity for faculty, students and staff to have one-on-one time with UNeMed, UNeTech, CQuence or MOVE professionals to discuss new technologies or startup potential.

UNeTech is the University of Nebraska’s startup incubator, supporting entrepreneurial efforts built on innovations created by University personnel. CQuence is a local venture organization focused on healthcare-related startups. MOVE is a pre-seed and seed venture capital firm focused on investing in Nebraska technology startup companies.

Morning Edition is typically held on the final Thursday of every month and will continue to feature guest speakers from the University’s stable of successful and budding startup companies and from Omaha’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. The event will provide UNMC and UNO innovators an opportunity to build new partnerships and allies that can help develop their innovative ideas and discoveries into products that help people.

A tentative list of upcoming Morning Editions include:

• May 28: Adrian Blake, CEO, Precision Syringe
• June 25: Andrew Rogers, CEO, Docology
• July 30: Jon Rhoades, CEO, Valid
• Aug 27: Jonell Tempero, Managing Dir, US Operations, RespirAI
• Sept 24: Jenilee Woltman, MS Ed, CEO, Mission Accomplished
• Oct 29: Riley Reynolds, MS, CEO, Rheam Medical
• Nov 19: Stephen Gliske, PhD, Co-Founder, NeuroServ
• Dec 17: Jessica Queen, RN, CEO, Omedus

The event is free and open to all, and complimentary refreshments will be provided as long as supplies last.

Morning Edition is part of UNeMed’s “Idea Pub,” a suite of entrepreneurial networking events that includes “Innovations & Libations” and “Startup Showcase.”

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Dr. Puri

OMAHA, Nebraska (April 8, 2026) — A software platform that grades and monitors retinal diseases won the top prize of UNeMed’s 2026 Back-o-the-Napkin Contest, officials announced today. 

Selected from a total of 20 entries, the winning idea was a cross-campus collaboration between UNMC’s Ron Krueger, MD, and Ashok Puri, MBBS, and UNL’s team of Ashok Samal, PhD, and Sanyam Agarwal. Their inventive approach would optimize diagnosing and monitoring retinal diseases while offering optimal treatment strategies for improved patient outcomes. As the winning entry, the project will receive additional developmental support and guidance. 

Dr. Krueger

Contest entries were judged on the following criteria: patentability, feasibility and market size. Eligible inventions included artificial intelligence programs or systems, software tools and applications, medical devices and research tools. All entries for the contest were also evaluated for their novelty and commercial potential. Even though only one entry could be selected for the prize, several other submissions are expected to move forward with additional testing or research. 

“Our gobs are smacked after receiving the highest number of contest entries to date,” UNeMed senior licensing specialist and contest director Amanda Hawley, PhD, said. “The submissions reflect the ingenuity and the innovative mindset of the University of Nebraska System at work.” 

There were a record-high 20 entries, representing 18 departments and three campuses. UNMC fielded entries from the Colleges of Medicine, Allied Health, and Munroe Meyer. UNO was represented by the Colleges of Education, Information Systems and Quantitative Analysis and Information Science and Technology, and the National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology, and Education Center. The invention from UNL was from the College of Engineering.  Four of the total submissions were the result of inter-campus collaborations between UNMC, UNO and UNL. 

“It is wonderful to witness fruitful collaborations amongst our University of Nebraska clinicians and researchers,” Dr. Hawley said. “It truly takes a village to move innovations forward. Expanding our inter-campus connections, expertise and resources can only bolster the commercial potential for university inventions.” 

On average, UNeMed, the technology transfer and commercialization office for UNMC and UNO, will process about 100 new inventions every year from faculty, staff and students. The nature of inventions varies widely, ranging from software solutions and novel therapies to research tools and medical devices. 

“The advancement of many inventions stall out simply from a lack of resources,” Dr. Hawley said. “The support from the contest can bring in experts and skilled developers to give a much-needed boost to help make these inventions a reality and move to the next phase of development. And without it, these impactful innovations would fade into obscurity, never knowing their true potential.” 

The winning invention was titled, “A Retinal Disease Monitoring Platform and a Clinically Aligned Evaluation Metric for Retinal Lesion Segmentation.” 

UNeMed and the UNMC Great Plains IDeA-CTR co-sponsored the contest. 

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The University of Nebraska system landed No. 57 among the National Academy of Inventors’ national list of American universities to have secured United States patents during the 2025 calendar year.

Of the 39 University of Nebraska patents, 22 are connected to UNMC, 15 of which have been licensed for further development and research.

Among UNMC’s 2025 U.S. patents are a pair issued to Jingwei Xie, PhD, in the Department of Surgery and the Mary & Dick Holland Regenerative Medicine Program. Dr. Xie’s growing body of work now includes 10 issued patents with another 18 pending. All are related to his ground-breaking work in producing next-generation materials and methods for wound healing, tissue growth, drug delivery and sample collection, among others.

A UNMC Distinguished Scientists in 2020 and the 2019 Harold M. Mauer Scientific Achievement Award winner in 2019, Dr. Xie is among UNMC’s most prolific innovators. He has submitted 40 new inventions to UNeMed and was the tech transfer office’s Innovator of the Year at UNeMed’s 2024 Innovation Awards.

Additional patents issued to UNMC innovators include a joint patent issued to researchers Howard Gendelman, MD, and Benson Edagwa, PhD, for their work on a nanoformulation related to their work on improving HIV treatments.

Tammy Kielian, PhD, and Hani Haider, PhD, also secured two patents apiece. Dr. Kielian’s work includes a novel approach to a rare disease afflicting children and an unrelated collaborative project with Bin Duan, PhD, that established a new way to build antimicrobial structures. Dr. Haider’s patents are a corrective foot brace and a tracking system related to computer assisted surgery.

Other UNMC patents include a new surgical graft from Jason MacTaggart, MD; a novel radiopharmaceutical from Jered Garrison, PhD; and new CAR T-cells from Hamid Band, MD, PhD, and Vimla Band, PhD.

Despite UNMC’s strong portfolio of novel innovations, this is the first year Nebraska has dropped from the international list of top 100 of institutions since 2017 when it first cracked the list at No.70. Last year, Nebraska secured 49 U.S. patents to land at No. 82 on the global list.

Nebraska apparently just missed the current top international 100, which ended in a tie at No. 98 with four institutions at 40 patents apiece. Presumably, Nebraska’s 39 pushed it to No. 102 in the world, one short of a ninth-straight year in the top 100.

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At the March 26, 2026, Morning Edition event at Catalyst Omaha, Howard Gendelman, MD—Chair of UNMC’s Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Neuroscience and Chief Science Officer at his startup, NeuralRegen—chats with a guest following his short presentation about the innovative therapies he and his company are developing for treating neurodegenerative diseases.

OMAHA, Nebraska (March 26, 2026)—Howard Gendelman, MD, one of UNMC’s most prolific innovators, led Thursday’s installment of Idea Pub: Morning Editon with a short presentation about his new startup NeuralRegen.

Dr. Gendelman explained how NeuralRegen is developing more powerful therapies for neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s Disease. Their innovative approach aims to harness the natural healing and growth power found in nutrient-dense colostrum, the first milk produced in the mammary glands after giving birth. NeuralRegen has partnered with Oehlerking Dairy Farm in Elmwood, Nebraska, to provide the colostrum needed to develop the promising new technology.

Current treatments for Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s do little more than relieve symptoms while the underlying disease continues to progress, Dr. Gendelman said.

“We want to treat the disease. I can’t say cure the disease, but we can ameliorate it,” said Dr. Gendelman, Chair of UNMC’s Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Neuroscience.

“We want to move from the symptom-side approach to an ameliorative-side approach,” he added, noting that clinical testing could begin in 3-5 years, if all goes well.

Morning Edition is UNeMed’s and UNeTech Institute’s networking event for university innovators, entrepreneurs and startup community members. Catalyst Omaha co-sponsors the event and provides free tours of the spacious facility.

Additional sponsors include biomedical investment and mentoring firm CQuence Health and Arbor Bank, which provides coffee and doughnuts to guests.

Morning Edition will continue to be a fixture in the Forge Event Hall, located on the north end of Catalyst Omaha in the Edge District. Guided tours, coffee and doughnuts will also continue as added features.

In a temporary break from tradition, the next Idea Pub: Morning Edition will be held in the afternoon on Thursday, April 30, 2026, at 1 p.m. The featured speaker has not yet been announced.

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