Semifinalists vie for share of $50,000 prize pool

For the 16th straight year, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management is staging its $50K Entrepreneurship Competition, in which teams of students pit their business plans against those of rival teams. On the eve the May 9 selection of the winning business plan, the Boston Business Journal profiles the 32 semifinalists for a $30,000 first prize and two consolation prizes of $10,000 each.

Advanced Conductors: Lighting up the screen

Karl Ruping lets John Lock do the talking with respect to Advanced Conductors' vapor-deposition technology, but chances are it will be Ruping's rap when the time comes to talk to angel investors.

Advanced Conductors is developing a machine to create active nanoscale films for use in organic light-emitting diodes, which proponents say provide improved displays for electronic devices. OLEDs are said to consume less power while being brighter and offering wider viewing angles than liquid crystal displays.

Lock said scientists are studying how to replace incandescent bulbs with the technology.

Lock is an MIT graduate student in chemical engineering; Ruping is founder of incTank, a small, early-stage venture capital firm in Cambridge.

Advanced Conductors' vapor-deposition technology can boost LED efficiency by 50 percent over solution-based OLED manufacturing techniques under development, Lock says. He adds that Advanced Conductors' system reduces material waste by 20 percent while enabling coatings on devices that cannot withstand a solution-based approach.

-- Alexander Soule

Advanced Diamond Energy: If at first ...

Last year, Barnas Monteith and Michael Sung pulled off what few MIT students manage -- generating revenue prior to the $50K awards ceremony.

The judges decided that interest from Apple Computer Inc. and others was not enough to merit a top-three finish for Advanced Diamond Solutions Inc. But the core team is back this year with Advanced Diamond Energy.

Last year's entry, ADS, developed synthetic diamond material that drains heat away from sensitive electronics. Their new entry, ADE uses a similar material to capture excess heat produced in solar cells as they convert the sun's energy into electricity.

Sung said ADE's solution can double the total energy output of solar panels. Current solar cells can produce electricity costs of 30 cents per kilowatt hour; Sung estimates ADE's technology could yield costs around 10 cents.

ADE was also a finalist in MIT's Clean Energy entrepreneurship competition.

The technology was invented by Sung's father, James, who attended MIT before working on composites at General Electric Co. University of California Berkeley student Jay Liao also is on the team.

-- A.S.

Balico: Balancing act

Balico's technology is all about balance.

"We're hoping it will help reduce incidents of falling," said Kathleen Sienko, Balico's team leader and a doctoral student with the joint Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Harvard University health sciences and technology program.

The technology revolves around a sensory device that would be worn in a belt around a person's waist. Patients with poor vision or inner-ear problems that affect balance would wear the device. In essence, the sensors would vibrate if the patient moves too far sideways, forward or backward, and then stop vibrating once a person is sitting or standing straight.

Sienko, also a graduate student and associate with a lab at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, said the technology is already being tested there and has shown promise, particularly with patients suffering from inner ear problems. "Typically if you ask them to stand up and close their eyes they would fall over without wearing the device," she said.

Other potential patients would include the elderly or those with problems in their joints.

Sienko added that her partners in the Balico project are actively seeking funding.

-- Mark Hollmer

CarboTran Technologies: Going with the grain

CarboTran Technologies is one of two $50K semifinalists to make the finals of MIT's Clean Energy business competition this year, along with Advanced Diamond Energy.

Both will square off against LiquidPiston Inc., last year's $50K runner-up, which has had an additional year to hone its plan for the Clean Energy contest. LiquidPiston is developing an auxiliary engine that replaces metal pistons with pressurized liquid.

CarboTran co-founder Christopher McFadden isn't fazed by the competition in either contest. CarboTran is developing a way to treat wastewater runoff from ethanol plants and feed it back into the production loop as a power source. Team members include Reuben Cummings, Nick Haschka and Hugh McLaughlin.

After grain, energy is the single biggest cost of producing ethanol. Currently, ethanol detritus is centrifuged, dried and sold for use in animal feed.

"What we really need to do is get our minds around what this plant is going to look like at full scale," McFadden said. "In order to scale this up we can't take the existing technology and just make it bigger. ... It is easy enough to mix when you are talking about 25 pounds in the basement."

-- A.S.

Circle Finance: Enriching their peers

Credit is scarce among the world's poor, which makes it difficult for people with limited means to improve their economic status over the short-term.

Circle Finance plans to change that equation by offering an interest-free lending program for the working poor. The plan will allow these individuals -- estimated at around 530 million working poor and another 100 million immigrants from developing countries -- to pool their savings and then borrow from one another, interest free.

The two-person company is already seeking venture funding and hopes to bring in an around $650,000 within the next three months. Circle Finance will seek another $2 million shortly thereafter, according to co-founder Cornelius Colin McNab, who is also the co-founder of another $50K entrant, Upside Bound, a maker of robotic book scanners that is profiled below.

"We're in the process of incorporating, but we started our business plan last October," McNab said.

Should the company run to victory on May 9, McNab said the winnings will be used to develop a proof-of-concept pilot test. He said those trials would likely be conducted in Jamaica, Mexico or India.

-- Craig M. Douglas

Claros BioSystems: Blood test in a box

Picture a nurse on duty holding a device a little bit larger than a Blackberry handheld computer, 4 inches thick, 8 inches long and 6 inches wide.

She then pricks one of the patient's fingers to get a drop of blood, which is deposited into the device for testing. Within about 15 minutes, the device would then be able to evaluate the blood for HIV, at least two forms of hepatitis and maybe even syphilis.

That's how the signature device for Claros BioSystems Inc. is envisioned to work, according to John Fesko, head of business development for the fledgling company and a second-year MBA student at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Fesko says the technology, developed by Harvard University chemist George Whitesides, would be easy to use, and the founders are targeting as their initial market clinics that treat sexually transmitted diseases. That's because tests for STDs usually take a few days to produce results, Fesko said, and many patients don't return to discover the results. A quicker test, then, would lead to quicker diagnosis and then treatment.

The founders have a prototype and are now trying to raise capital.

-- M.H.

Emervation: Stem cells grow up

Despite their potential to treat everything from heart disease to brain disorders, embryonic stem cells continue to cause all kinds of political and ethical controversies.

Adult stem cells, however, barely cause a ripple in the debate. And though their effectiveness remains in dispute, Emervation believes its patented adult stem cell technology can successfully repair damaged heart tissue.

"We've shown pretty good results in animal models and will be taking it to the next level to see if we can bring that into humans," said Mark Strohmaier, Emervation's chief operating officer and an MBA student at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Strohmaier said the technology showed early promise after being tested on 15 rats in 2003 at St. Elizabeth's Medical Center. St. Elizabeth's, he said, developed the approach in conjunction with Tufts University Medical School.

The stakes are high. At least 1.2 million people die of heart attacks in the United States alone each year, according to estimates. For those who survive, heart attacks can leave scar tissue that diminishes how well a heart functions.

-- M.H.

GetGo Audio: Audio files

Blurry eyes may be a thing of the past for avid readers of Web-based content, thanks in part to a new technology that can convert online text into audio files.

The technology is the brainchild of GetGo Audio, a four-person company that has already won $50,000 in another technology competition hosted by Yale University. The firm is completing their software-based prototype and plans to seek additional funding from outside investors this year, officials said.

This back-end product is hosted by GetGo Audio and is triggered when customers post content on their respective Web pages. The company's technology can then immediately generate an automated audio file, which can then be posted on a client's Web site. The company's fee-based service will initially be targeted at publishers, advertisers and individual consumers using portable audio devices.

GetGo Audio said human-converted files, whereby a person reads aloud and records the content digitally, are also an option. "It's really up to the customer," said Vipul Khamar, one of the company's founders.

Khamar said pricing will also vary, depending on whether an automated or human-generated response is requested.

-- C.M.D

HealRight: Ties that bind

HealRight's core technology centers around the idea that emergency room patients may have wounds that need closing that don't necessarily require surgery and in fact might be better off without stitches.

Dr. Daniel Riskin, a HealRight founder and a 2004 graduate of the MIT Sloan School of Management, describes the technology as a "mechanical closure device" or "rapid closure system" that uses "a new generation of mechanical bonding techniques."

He won't offer specifics yet. But Riskin, now a research fellow at Stanford University, says a doctor would apply the HealRight treatment by using a "low profile" soft plastic device that closes each wound. It will either be made of clear or white plastic, he added.

Once applied, the patient would be allowed to go home. The plastic would remain on the skin for two weeks, after which it could be removed.

Riskin added the product will initially be targeted to the pediatric market.

There are four founders behind HealRight, including Cole Sirucek, who is part of a joint degree program between MIT/Sloan and the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

-- M.H.

IMetrico: They're watching

Purveyors of market research and consumer products take note: MIT's Media Lab has developed a new, patent-pending technology that could make your lives a whole lot easier -- and profitable.

The invention is the brainchild of IMetrico, a recently incorporated company founded by Anmol Madan, a graduate student within MIT's venerable technology incubator. Picking up on speech and body-language patterns, the firm's technology increases the ability of marketers, advertisers -- virtually anyone interested in consumer behavior -- to improve their product placement and to target a wider pool of prospective customers.

In fact, IMetrico says its software and wireless gadgets are 15 percent to 25 percent more effective in gauging customer behavior than existing market-research techniques. After months of testing, Madan says the firm's technology is 80 percent accurate in determining whether a consumer will purchase a given product.

"People are paying huge amounts of money to perform these studies," said Madan, who estimates that around $500 million is spent annually on market research. "This is a huge value-add for these companies."

Madan said he is discussing trials and seeking seed capital from a handful of potential customers, and will likely seek a venture round within the year.

-- C.M.D.

IntelliToys: Dynamic playtime

Kids can be fickle when it comes to toys. One minute, a stuffed animal can be all the rage; minutes later, it's yesterday's news.

IntelliToys has developed a way to change that dynamic, arming parents with a "new class" of talking toys that can be continually customized and refreshed with content provided over the Internet.

The seven-person team is not incorporated and has not landed any funding to date, but organizers noted that a prototype is in the works. IntelliToys officials said the concept has been tested with parents via surveys and interviews. The firm will initially target its talking toys at children ages 3 to 5 years, "when children are developing literacy," said Karen Wong, an IntelliToys co-founder.

"As the market develops, we will expand upwards in age ... and perhaps even downward," she said. "Today's children are much more technologically savvy, and parents mention how kids of even age 3 are computer aware."

To customize each toy's content, IntelliToys will equip the products with "plug-and-play" hardware that can link to the Web.

-- C.M.D.

Laplace Medical Technologies: Heading off the seizure

The debut product for Laplace Medical Technologies is essentially a state-of-the-art helmet that will prevent epileptic seizures.

As envisioned, the helmet, equipped with sensitive electrodes, would detect where in the brain a seizure is originating, and then neutralize it with electrical stimulation. Call it a "seizure defibrillator," a device designed to be battery-powered, portable, noninvasive, easy to use and fast-acting.

The product is in its early development stages; an animal prototype has only been designed so far for rats.

If successful, the helmet could be carried by emergency medical technicians and also used at hospital emergency rooms, according to Kranthi Kiran Vistakula, the fledgling company's vice president for operations and a research assistant at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

The company describes the device as something that could revolutionize emergency response, enabling non-medical people to treat a patient suffering a seizure immediately.

-- M.H.

LegalSpot: Making a case for savings

Technology expenses can add up quickly for any business, but they can be especially burdensome for small, privately owned firms.

Sensing opportunity among companies with limited resources but a strong need for industry-specific software, $50K entrant LegalSpot has developed a plan to deliver a suite of industry-specific products to private practitioners.

The six-person company has decided to first target the legal profession, given its overall size and the firm's strong contacts among within that field, LegalSpot said. The company estimates there are more than 470,000 legal practices in the United States with fewer than 10 employees.

"Our idea is to build an integrated suite of software that is delivered as a hosted service," said Dharmesh Shah, LegalSpot's co-founder.

Shah said the company plans to expand into other "verticals," or professional markets, in the near term. The company has not raised any capital to date, but said it plans to eventually "bootstrap" itself with between $4 million and $6 million.

To develop its products, LegalSpot plans to leverage the flexibility and creativity linked to open-source software while also tapping the efficiency and productivity of "off-shore talent." Some of the firm's intellectual property stems from similar software developed by Shah for the financial services industry.

-- C.M.D.

LogiMax Systems: Long-haul logistics

Xuepin Cen estimates half the freight trucks in China are owned by their drivers, who lack access to sophisticated scheduling operations. That means after delivering a load, truckers risk heading home with an empty cargo bay.

Cen's $50K team, LogiMax Systems, is developing a short messaging system that truckers could use to indicate their destination and receive a dispatch for the return trip.

That would replace an ad hoc system used today, in which truckers head to parking areas to barter with commission-based freight agents.

Cen's teammates are MIT fellow Xiangqiu Chen and Rick Shrotri, a Harvard University graduate who today works for a Louisiana software startup.

Cen said building the system will be relatively easy, with the software handling credit, bidding and instant messaging.

The challenge will be in getting the word out about LogiMax, given the fragmented nature of the Chinese trucking market. Cen said LogiMax will try to land marketing arrangements with Chinese cell phone companies carrying the messages, as well as a word-of-mouth campaign in the parking lots where truckers get assignments today.

-- A.S.

MedPacks: Heart guard

MedPacks sees a day when a patient who is susceptible to a heart attack could administer his or her own medicine to either treat the episode or potentially head it off.

The company is developing a product, perhaps available by prescription, that would be shaped like a high-quality pen and that would contain a detailed set of instructions to walk a patient through signs and symptoms if a heart attack seems to be on its way.

The pen would also contain various FDA-approved medicines, potentially everything from aspirin to beta-blockers, allowing a patient to treat a heart attack early or even before it occurs, potentially avoiding post-heart attack damage that can occur in as little as 20 minutes. If there's a false alarm, then the drugs would be safe enough to cause no harm.

"Of course it's not 100 percent, but we can (offer) a pretty good estimation of what's going on with a patient," said David Berry, who is helping with MedPacks strategic and business development. He's also medical/graduate student pursuing a joint degree through Harvard University and the MIT.

Berry is also a principal behind another $50K finalist, Vacuum Extraction Technologies, profiled below.

-- M.H.

MicroBiobotics: Single-cell organization

Ted Acworth was $50K runner-up two years back with Brontes Technologies Inc., a 3-D imaging firm in Woburn which became the first contestant from that year to raise venture financing.

Evidently Acworth likes a challenge -- MicroBiobotics' goal is tougher still. The team is designing minuscule robotic "grippers" that could grab individual cells for injection. Essentially, the team proposes a radically simple way to perform "cellular surgery," a process that today takes hours using relatively rudimentary equipment.

The MicroBiobotics team includes researchers from several institutions, including MIT's Martin Culpepper, Harvard University's Alex Kim and Max Narovlyansky, Gabriel Kra of Columbia University and Matthijs van Leeuwen of the University of Cambridge in England.

It takes a scientific village, as MicroBiobotics' challenge spans several disciplines, including microfluidics, microbiology and micro electro-mechanical systems, or MEMS. The system would flush a cell out of a surrounding liquid by forcing it through a microfluidics sieve, which then would deposit it into the gripper. An electrical charge would grab the cell and rotate toward a fixed syringe. DNA could then be injected or removed, and the cell retrieved.

-- A.S.

MicroDiagnostics: Custom fit

What if you could assess each individual cancer patient's genetic variation, and then use that knowledge to create a better treatment?

That's what MicroDiagnostics Inc. is hoping to accomplish. This MIT $50K finalist has developed a 1-inch-by-1-inch plastic chip that would help genetically profile each individual.

The chip comprises an elastic polymer with 96 etched channels through which biomaterial can flow and then be scanned.

Neil Kumar is one of the company's co-founders and a chemical-engineering doctoral student at MIT. He describes the device as something that could also serve as a potential "DNA biochip" through which you could assess how genes or proteins move up and down within different biological samples.

This type of device is needed, he said, to give doctors and researchers the ability to run a large number of samples from patients and better understand gene variation.

The test could also accomplish this more quickly and cheaply, in a matter of minutes, rather than hours or a day.

The technology came out of the MIT lab of Todd Thorsen, an MIT professor of mechanical engineering.

-- M.H.

Nanocell Power: Power play

Nanocell Power is one of two teams to receive an MIT Deshpande Center grant before moving on to the $50K semifinals, along with MicroFluidics.

Nanocell is attempting to commercialize MIT Prof. Yang Shao-Horn's method for extracting more power from fuel cells, which siphon hydrogen atoms through a membrane to peel off electrons for electricity.

Shao-Horn's manufacturing process more evenly distributes expensive catalyst and carbon nanofibers in the fuel cell membrane. Nanocell is in preliminary discussions with Southborough fuel cell company Protonex Technology Corp. about applications of the technology, among other firms.

Technical challenges remain, says team member Jeffrey Baer -- none more important than consistently "painting" the membrane evenly so that "hot spots" do not develop.

"If it is thicker in one spot, the catalytic reaction is going to happen faster there," Baer explained. "That could melt through the membrane and ground out the fuel cell."

The Nanocell team is among the largest remaining in the $50K and includes Ian MacDonald, John Paul Kurpiewski, Howard Tang, Jin Yi and Matt Ziskin.

-- A.S.

Neuroplaz: Resurrecting withered nerves

When a patient suffers a stroke, some of the neurons in the brain begin to die within a few hours. Some sort of recovery can take place over time, however, as the remaining neurons reconnect to take over the functions once served by their withered brethren.

Neuroplaz hopes to use its new drug to improve the recovery process. The compound, if successful, would accelerate the reconnection of those remaining neurons, explains Alexey Eliseev, a Neuroplaz founder and fellow at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Eliseev said he can't talk too much about the compound because patent applications are still in progress.

Down the line, however, he envisions the compound as potentially being able to treat conditions well beyond strokes, including spinal chord injuries and Alzheimer's disease.

The compound certainly has a pedigree behind it. MIT professor Mriganka Sur, who heads the university's department of brain and cognitive sciences, developed the compound along with the lab of Robert Langer, a well-known MIT inventor.

Neuroplaz has been seeking seed funding over the last month and hopes to start some initial studies using animal models in the coming months.

-- M.H.

Optinetix: Putting it on paper

Advertising executives and television broadcasters may be able to breath a collective sigh of relief in the coming months if a new technology in this year's $50K competition ever hits the mainstream.

The product is a handheld television remote control equipped with a miniature printer that produces paper coupons and detailed information relative to the content being broadcast on-screen. The gadget was designed by Eran Shavelsky and Gabi Ilan, who operate under the corporate name of Optinetix.

Shavelsky said the firm has already raised $1.5 million in venture capital and hopes to raise another $3 million over the next year. He said the money will be used for marketing purposes and to refine Optinetix's proprietary hardware and software.

"Now we're looking for a second round of investment to build a market, mainly in the U.S.," Shavelsky said.

To work, broadcasters and advertisers must buy into the Optinetix technology, meaning they must provide relevant content -- coupons, product information, biographical statistics -- during each of their broadcasts. For a sporting event, that may mean player statistics. Product retailers may offer ingredients, sales information and promotional discounts, for example.

-- C.M.D.

Playful Invention Co.: Reinventing play time

Technology and toys are always in fashion, and The Playful Invention Co. is planning to combine the two and revolutionize the way children entertain themselves by leveraging a concept first developed in MIT's Media Lab.

The company said it is trying to "break down traditional boundaries" between technology and art by introducing hands-on products that are appealing to both boys and girls. PICO says its products consist of "digital craft materials" that let kids explore, experiment, and express themselves through interactive inventions.

These projects combine lights, sensors and other programmable parts that enable children to create musical sculptures, interactive jewelry, communicating creatures and other playful inventions.

Prototypes of PICO's educational toys have already been developed and testing is in the works, the company said.

PICO is planning its first official product release some time this summer, targeting children age 8 and older.

-- C.M.D.

Presbytek: Acute focus

Like many new companies, Presbytek's name has already changed, to OsioCorp., of which Presbytek will be a division.

But its mission and core technology is the same: to improve the vision of those who struggle to focus on nearby objects.

The company's technology combines two things: eye drops to soften the cornea and then a contact lens worn daily for up to two weeks to help reshape it. Software is used to determine the correct shape and size of the contact lens.

The treatment is designed for middle-aged patients suffering from a condition known as presbyopia, also known as "short arms disease," which reduces the ability to focus on close objects. It is designed to replace eyeglasses, regular contact lenses or surgery, none of which are permanent fixes and can ultimately compromise vision, said OsioCorp. CEO Alberto Osio, also an MBA candidate at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

What's more, Osio said, a treatment update would only be needed every five years, and it could be easily prescribed by an optometrist.

Osio said the treatment is also noteworthy because it would have no side effects.

"We're less invasive and we fix the problem," he said.

-- M.H.

Previva: Breath of innovation

Previva Inc.'s device under development looks like a typical asthma inhaler, but if successful, it will be so much more than that.

The company's VentStar inhaler contains both computer hardware and software that will detect, after a patient uses the inhaler, if an asthma attack is coming on.

If an attack is coming, the device will flash and beep. It will also remotely notify a health care provider of the incipient attack, so that a patient can obtain treatment before an attack strikes.

"There is no such device that does this today," said Bruno Kurtic, an MBA student at the MIT Sloan School of Management and Previva's vice president of strategy and technology development.

Kurtic said he sees a huge market for Previva's technology because doctors currently must rely on data they get from patients themselves; nothing exists that would alert a patient to an asthma attack before it happens.

Previva estimates that 26 million Americans suffer from asthma or related pulmonary diseases, costing them $22 billion each year.

The product, Kurtic said, remains under development.

-- M.H.

Renal Diagnostics Inc.: Danger warning

The debut device for Renal Diagnostics Inc. is designed to detect acute kidney failure more quickly so those patients can in turn be treated sooner.

The company doesn't have a prototype yet, but designs call for an 8-inch by 10-inch device that can sit at a patient's bedside. The device will measure metabolites in urine, which are the end product of the breakdown of certain proteins in the body. One kind, known as creatinine, can indicate kidney failure or that the condition is coming on.

Shawn Stovall, a fellow with the MIT Sloan School of Management and a Renal Diagnostics founder, said his company's device would fill a void because it can analyze the creatinine level in real time and detect when it is changing. Current treatment calls for blood tests over a much longer period.

The technology originated with students at Johns Hopkins University, including Seth Townsend, an MIT graduate student. The company is seeking seed-stage capital but has raised some money by entering and winning other business plan competitions.

-- M.H.

Sensus Analytics: Attention, cell-enabled shoppers

Several of this year's $50K entrants plan to do business in foreign lands. Sensus Analytics already incorporated and is operating overseas.

Sensus Analytics' Toby Oliver has developed a way to collect consumer information from a cell phone chip as shoppers walk through malls. The company incorporated in the United Kingdom last year.

The team includes Oliver's spouse, Sharon Biggar, who is on a leave from MIT Sloan caring for the couple's baby at home in Britain. Also on board is Nick Jones, who previously worked on several mall developments in Europe.

"There are a number of companies attempting wireless location, but none of them are able to locate mobile phones from any network, whilst the phone is indoors and to a location accuracy of around three to nine feet," Biggar noted. "In addition, the way our technology works alleviates privacy concerns, as the owner of the mobile phone remains anonymous and we are able to collect the signals from a large number of shoppers simultaneously."

In February Sensus beat out approximately 100 other teams to share third place in a Cornell University competition open to entrepreneurs from across the country.

-- A.S.

Thermal Revolutions: Clothes call

Kranthi Vistakula is one of three people to enter two companies in this year's $50K, along with David Berry and Cornelius Colin McNab. McNab, too, is working on another company profiled this week, Upside Bound.

Vistakula's Laplace Medical Technologies, profiled last week, aims to produce an electrode-studded helmet to neutralize seizures. Thermal Revolutions, meanwhile, is designing clothing that would cool or warm its wearer on command.

The Thermal Revolutions team includes Cyril Ettori, Joseph Moritz and Alexandria Sams.

Vistakula said Thermal Revolutions is initially targeting firefighters and soldiers, and in time outdoor workers and sports enthusiasts. The company is working to complete a test version by October.

-- A.S.

TissueVision: Up close and dimensional

Analytical-tool maker TissueVision is hoping to tap the lucrative drug-development market by producing a 3-D imaging microscope with the ability to scrutinize materials smaller than one-tenth the size of a cell.

This high-speed, high-resolution product was developed by TissueVision's two-man team and has already garnered interest from local hospitals and universities, according to the company's founders. "A lot of people seem to be excited about trying this," said co-founder Tim Ragan, noting that the company is also targeting its product at major drug developers.

TissueVision was incorporated in 2001 and has already received $120,000 in government grants to build a prototype. Ragan said the microscope has shown significant potential in analyzing cancer cells and how they metastasize.

-- C.M.D.

Upside Bound: Beyond the binding

Who hasn't wasted valuable time and reams of paper trying to accurately photocopy or digitally scan pages from a cumbersome textbook or encyclopedia?

Boston-based Upside Bound is trying to mitigate that process by developing a robotic book scanner that automatically flips the pages of books, pamphlets and any other bound materials.

The three-person company is already raising $350,000 in seed funding from angels, and its founders hope to tap the private equity markets for another $2 million within the next six months.

"We're absolutely seeking venture funding," said co-founder Cornelius Colin McNab.

Upside Bound's business plan was first developed in February, and continues to be refined as MIT's $50K competition advances, McNab said. Should the company win, the prize money will be used to develop a prototype of its machine.

-- C.M.D.

Vacuum Extraction Technologies: The hole solution

In winning February's Lemelson-MIT Student Prize for inventiveness, judges did not even mention David Berry's newest invention -- essentially a giant vacuum cleaner to excavate soil without damaging underground utility conduits.

Vacuum Extraction Technologies marks Berry's second entry in the $50K. With Richard Resnick he reached the semifinals last year with a plan to convert algae into hydrogen.

The pair decided to table the project, citing high startup costs. Resnick now leads Harmony Line Inc., last year's runner-up that has already raised $600,000 to sell software for composing mobile telephone ringtones.

Berry and Dean Bolton, meanwhile, already have a VET prototype at work on the ultimate proving ground -- the Big Dig. The device attaches to a backhoe and uses high-power jets to suck up broken soil at 15 times the rate of conventional backhoes.

Berry hopes to raise at least $2 million in funding this year, likely from a construction equipment maker like Caterpillar Inc. or Deere & Co.

-- A.S.

Visible Measures: On-the-fly-ware

Software developers are constantly creating new generations of products that have additional features and functions that are increasingly relevant to end-users.

Visible Measures has created a way for these programmers to gain customer feedback in the midst of the product-development process.

Brian Shin, one of the company's co-founders, said the company's software enables developers to better focus their project-management efforts, as changes can be made on the fly in a way that makes their products more marketable.

He said the program can be integrated into an existing software project during any stage of its development cycle. End users can also provide similar feedback, relative to future product iterations, after the application has been installed.

A prototypes has been in testing since September at a local software firm, and is set for trials at six other development firms. "I think this product is ready for launch," Shin said.

Visible Measures is incorporated and will likely seek between $500,000 and $1 million in funding from angel investors within the year, he said.

-- C.M.D.

Wider Reach: Remote possibilities

Establishing trade and commerce has always been a challenge for developing countries, but a new cell phone technology has the potential to change that dynamic in remote locations around the world.

Wider Reach's software links willing buyers and sellers in a virtual marketplace, offering goods and services that are in high demand in both rural and urban areas. Wider Reach is first targeting the Indian subcontinent and eastern Asia, hoping to leverage the popularity of cell phones in those regions, the company said.

Wider Reach is a six-person business that grew out of MIT's world-renowned Media Lab. The firm's co-founders say they are in the process of incorporating and are considering a variety of funding opportunities.

"We're talking with people, but nothing's signed as of yet," said Joe Zeff, who head's Wider Reach's business development.

Zeff said the firm's online marketplace differs from other Web-based products, namely auction site eBay.com, as it allows merchants and wholesalers to offer products at set prices to customers in remote areas of the world.

-- C.M.D.

YDCTech: Searching for the top spot

Just as Google Inc. knocked off AltaVista and Lycos as the dominant Internet search engine, Gary Gao believes his YDCTech can do the same to Baidu, China's most popular search engine.

Gao is a Harvard University genomics researcher who, with colleague George Church, developed a computerized technique to divide strings of genomic information at the proper points.

"Mother nature does not make it easy to find where the boundaries are," said team member Joe Lemay.

The same algorithms can be applied to computer searches -- a fact that is particularly relevant in China, where characters run together and cause search terms to cull obscure and irrelevant returns.

Gao and Church's idea has floated down the Charles River to MIT, where Sloan School of Management students Lemay, Bernard Chan and Edward Shi have entered it in the $50K competition. YDCTech has set up an office in Beijing, and is busy fund raising.

-- A.S.