UCF Among Top 20 U.S. Public Universities Granted U.S. Utility Patents in 2024
With this ranking, UCF secures its placement with 68 patents on the National Academy of Inventors worldwide list for the 12th consecutive year.
University of Central Florida
Powered by world-class faculty who are leaders and inventors in their fields, Florida’s Premier Engineering and Technology University now ranks among the top 20 U.S. public universities for utility patents granted.
UCF ranks No. 51 overall in the world and No. 20 among U.S. public universities in a National Academy of Inventors (NAI) list announced today.
Patents play a crucial role in fostering innovation and protecting intellectual property, enabling universities like UCF to transform groundbreaking research into real-world applications. UCF’s high ranking by the NAI highlights its significant contributions to global technological advancements and its commitment to driving positive change worldwide. Developing patents also underscores UCF’s reputation for innovation. UCF has ranked as the most innovative university in Florida for seven consecutive years, according to U.S. News & World Report.
“UCF’s high ranking amongst top patent producing public universities in the U.S. and worldwide underscores our exceptionally talented and innovative researchers,” says Winston V. Schoenfeld, UCF’s vice president for research and innovation. “Each year, we continue to rise through the rankings, demonstrating the continued growth of our research enterprise and commitment to developing technologies that have global value. It’s been incredibly gratifying to see our researchers’ hard work culminate into patents that propel science and ultimately change the world.”
The rankings are based on The Top 100 Worldwide Universities List. The rankings use calendar year data provided by the United States Patent and Trademark Office and aim to provide a comprehensive view of intellectual property protection in the innovation ecosystem.
“Patents are vital for universities because they stimulate innovation, foster economic growth, and positively impact quality of life,” says Svetlana Shtrom ’08MBA, director of UCF’s Office of Technology Transfer.
For the 2024 ranking, UCF secures its placement with 68 patents on the NAI worldwide list for the 12th consecutive year.
The patent process is undertaken by the UCF Office of Technology Transfer team of professionals who have a combined expertise in science, business and law. Their team helps bring promising research discoveries to the marketplace through customized intellectual property protections, market research and licensing.
“Patents are vital for universities because they stimulate innovation, foster economic growth, and positively impact quality of life,” says Svetlana Shtrom ’08MBA, director of UCF’s Office of Technology Transfer. “Our office works as the bridge between industry partners and our world-class researchers by promoting commercialization of novel inventions into products that deliver a range of economic, health and other global benefits.”
The NAI is a member organization comprised of U.S. and international universities, and governmental and nonprofit research institutes, with over 4,600 individual inventor members and fellows spanning more than 260 institutions.
Patents That Impact the World
UCF researchers are contributing to developments from immune cell modifications to better fight disease to free-space optical communication systems to enhance wireless technology. Here is a collection of UCF inventions that led to patents in 2024:
Immune Cell Modifications to Better Fight Disease
Lead researcher: Associate Professor Alicja Copik
Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences
This invention relates to methods and compositions for modulating the activity of natural killer (NK) cells. NK cells are a type of immune cell that plays a critical role in eliminating infected or cancerous cells. The disclosed methods and compositions can enhance NK cell activity, thereby improving the immune system’s ability to fight disease. These methods may offer advantages over previous approaches to stimulating NK cells, such as improved specificity, reduced toxicity, or enhanced effectiveness against certain types of cancer or infection. This technology was licensed to a UCF startup company which was later acquired.
Color-changing Fabric for Use in Advertising, Fashion or Camouflage
Lead researcher: UCF Trustee Chair and Professor Ayman Abouraddy
College of Optics and Photonics
The invention discloses a color-changing fabric and its various applications. The fabric incorporates materials or technologies that allow it to change color in response to external stimuli, such as temperature, light, or electrical signals. This offers advancements over traditional fabrics with fixed colors, enabling dynamic and interactive applications in fashion, advertising, and camouflage. Compared to prior attempts to create color-changing fabrics, this invention outlines materials or techniques that achieve a wider color range, improved durability, faster response times or greater control over the color change process.
Low-cost, Low-power, Free-space Optical Communications System
Lead researcher: Associate Research Professor Kyle Renshaw
College of Optics and Photonics
The invention details an imaging-based transmitter and receiver system designed for free-space optical communications. Free-space optical communication uses light to transmit data through the air, as opposed to using wires or optical fibers. The system utilizes optical imaging techniques to precisely align and transmit data-encoded light beams through the atmosphere or space, enabling high-bandwidth wireless communication. This approach may offer advantages over traditional radio frequency communications or non-imaging optical systems in terms of data capacity, security or resistance to interference.
AI and Mixed Reality Framework to Analyze Civil Infrastructure and More
Lead researcher: Postdoctoral Scholar Enes Karaaslan ’19PhD
Department of Civil, Environmental and Construction Engineering
College of Engineering and Computer Science
This invention discloses methods for artificial intelligence assisted infrastructure assessment using mixed reality systems. Mixed reality combines elements of both physical and virtual environments, allowing users to interact with both simultaneously. The mixed reality system overlays digital information onto the real world, enabling inspectors to visualize and assess infrastructure conditions with the aid of AI-powered analysis. Unlike traditional infrastructure assessment methods that rely on manual inspection and limited data, this AI-assisted approach can automatically identify potential problems, analyze large datasets, and provide more comprehensive and objective assessments. This leads to more efficient, accurate and safer infrastructure management.
Efficient Moon Water Extraction System to Sustain Lunar Missions
Lead researcher: Planetary Scientist Phil Metzger ’00MS ’05PhD
The invention describes a system for extracting water from lunar regolith and the associated method. Lunar regolith is the loose soil and rock material on the surface of the moon. The system employs techniques to heat and process lunar soil to liberate water, which is then collected and purified. This technology is crucial for enabling long-term lunar missions and establishing sustainable lunar bases. Compared to transporting water from Earth, extracting water from lunar resources would significantly reduce the cost and complexity of lunar exploration. This system may offer improved efficiency, scalability, or resource utilization compared to previous lunar water extraction concepts.
Lung Cancer Killing Proteins
Lead researcher: Professor Annette Khaled
Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences
Genes provide instructions for making proteins, but these proteins must be folded into functional three-dimensional shapes by helper proteins called chaperones. Cancer cells depend heavily on chaperones due to their unstable genes that produce many damaging misfolded proteins. While initially found to be safe, available drugs that inhibit protein-folding chaperones in cancer cells did not stop cancer growth since chaperones are abundant and hard to inhibit without toxicity.
Researchers identified a chaperonin called CCT, highly expressed in cancer cells but not in healthy cells. Unlike other chaperones, CCT folds proteins essential for cancer growth and spread. The invention is a small peptide designed to target and bind the subunits that form the CCT machine, inhibiting its ability to fold proteins. This peptide can be delivered to solid tumors like breast or prostate cancer using nanoparticles. Cancer cells take up the peptide and, within hours, lose the ability to form essential proteins needed for their survival and die. In contrast, healthy cells that take the peptide are minimally affected. The CCT inhibitory peptide is a first-in-kind drug that is a substrate-independent of the chaperonin and has broad application.
This technology is being licensed to a startup company.
Energy-storing Fibers for Use in Electric Vehicles
Lead researcher: Associate Professor Jayan Thomas
This patent details a method for storing energy in the carbon fiber-based electric vehicle body panels. Carbon fiber is a strong and lightweight material used in vehicle construction. The carbon fiber panels are designed to function as structural components as well as energy storage devices, increasing the energy density and efficiency of electric vehicles. Compared to traditional batteries, this approach integrates energy storage directly into the vehicle structure, potentially reducing weight and improving space utilization.
Advanced PFAS Water Filtration System
Lead researcher: Professor Ni-bin Chang
Department of Civil, Environmental and Construction Engineering
College of Engineering and Computer Science
This patented water treatment system uses a filtration media mix of recyclable materials to promote removal of contaminants, including perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) from water sources, which are part of the PFAS chemicals linked to cancer and other health risks. UCF is seeking commercial partners to license this technology, for more information please contact Andrea.White@ucf.edu.
Quantum Cascade Laser to Convert Electrical Energy into Infrared Light
Lead researcher: Associate Professor Arkadiy Lyakh
This patent introduces a Quantum Cascade Laser (QCL) designed for high efficiency. A QCL is a type of laser that emits infrared light. The new QCL structure maximizes the conversion of electrical energy into infrared light. Compared to previous QCL designs, this new structure is optimized to minimize energy loss during the conversion process, leading to improved efficiency. The improved efficiency reduces power consumption and improves thermal management. This efficient QCL can be used in spectroscopy (analyzing light spectra), gas sensing and free-space communications, making it useful in various scientific and industrial fields where power consumption is a key consideration. This technology is licensed to a UCF startup company.
Machine Learning System to Analyze Actions via Computer Vision
Lead researcher: Graduate Research Assistant Ishan Rajendrakumar Dave ’24PhD
Department of Computer Science
College of Engineering and Computer Science
This patented system uses machine learning techniques to recognize actions from video data without requiring explicit labels, thus reducing the need and expense for human annotation while mitigating privacy concerns by removing associated sensitive data within a scene. This system is particularly relevant in applications such as surveillance video, healthcare and human-computer interactions.
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