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Dr Mukesh Kumar has been named as a finalist at the 2017 MIT Technology Review’s ‘Innovators Under 35 Europe’ awards in recognition for his work on technology to help improve clinical blood testing.
The ‘Innovators Under 35’ is an annual list published by MIT Technology Review magazine, naming Europe’s top 35 innovators under the age of 35. The awards honour accomplishments that judges believe will have a dramatic impact on the world.
Dr Kumar, 31 has been shortlisted, from a very large number of international candidates, for the Biotechnology category as an inventor/entrepreneur. He will attend a special award ceremony in Paris on Thursday, September 14.
He has been working with clinicians at the Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust and technology company eBiogen to develop a portable bedside blood diagnostics device that promises to improve healthcare treatments for sepsis, cancer patients, post-operative care and monitor the health of babies in the womb.
A panel of judges said of Dr Kumar’s nomination: “The project is one of the top entries that we received. We like this project very much since it can massively improve healthcare, and hopefully also diminish costs associated to bureaucracy and of personnel in running centralised labs for diagnostics.”
Dr Kumar said: “To be shortlisted for such a prestigious award is quite an honour indeed. I am elated to have made it this far in the competition. I am looking forward to meeting with people from all disciplines in the vibrant community of European and global innovators.”
The technology that Dr Kumar is developing uses novel biosensors to rapidly measure the key blood parameters, providing clinicians with information within five minutes rather than the current four-hour turnaround experienced within hospitals. The technology also promises to be simple to use, compact and cost-effective.
Professor Peter Fielden, Head of Chemistry at Lancaster, who was a referee in support of the nomination, said: “Mukesh has been at the heart of a highly innovative project that he has driven. This project would make a transformational contribution towards the effective care of high dependency patients. His holistic approach in this project has been exemplary.”
Dr David Telford, retired Consultant Microbiologist at Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust and who nominated Dr Kumar for the award, said: “In my previous life as a clinician, medical director and educationalist, I have met many highly able young professionals and Mukesh is one of the most outstanding. I am confident that he will become highly influential in biotechnology and medicine, probably at a global level.”