The Duke of York visits Imperial to witness healthcare innovations

His Royal Highness, The Duke of York, visited Imperial College London to visit early-stage companies in the Imperial Incubator.

Thursday 3 March 2011
By Simon Watts

His Royal Highness, The Duke of York, visited Imperial College London on Wednesday 2 March 2011 to learn about the College’s pioneering healthcare innovations in the UK and internationally. He heard about the College’s international partnerships, visited early-stage companies in the Imperial Incubator and learnt about developing robotic technologies to enhance surgery.

Hosting The Duke of York, the Rector of Imperial College London, Sir Keith O’Nions, explained that the university’s application of its work to industry, commerce and healthcare has been central to its mission since its foundation in 1907:

“Universities carry the weight of many expectations in today’s world. At Imperial all three strands of our mission – education, research and translation – are interwoven and hold equal weight. But arguably it is the translation of our core activities – broadening the reach and impact of our education and research – that brings most value to society. We are proud that The Duke of York is keen to hear about some of the results of that focus for the College.”

Speaking at the end of his tour, The Duke of York said: “Imperial College has, to my mind, gripped the problem of being able to deliver its output internationally in a way that many other universities have not been able to achieve. It’s not just about education, it’s about allowing people to innovate, and to expand their minds in order to do the things that I’ve seen going on here. I would just like to say, as the UK’s Special Representative for International Trade and Investment, that what you do is utterly brilliant.”

During his visit, The Duke was given a tour of the Imperial Incubator which houses 17 early-stage technology companies spun out of Imperial College. Each receives support from Imperial Innovations, the company that commercialises technologies and discoveries emanating from the College and which is the only university-owned commercialisation company to be publicly listed.

Among the companies The Duke visited was RepRegen, which is developing biomaterials to repair bones that have been damaged from disease, trauma or surgical intervention. Professor Molly Stevens, Chief Scientific Officer of RepRegen, and Professor of Biomedical Materials and Regenerative Medicine in the Faulty of Engineering, gave The Duke an overview of what the company is doing in the field of bone repair. She said, “We explained how our first product StronBone heals bone extremely well, and has recently received CE Marking Approval, certifying that it has met EU consumer safety, health or environmental requirements. We also showed him our next generation products which include porous granules for bone repair and a putty that a surgeon can mould into different shapes to help to fill more complex bone defects. The Duke was asking us about the mechanism of action, the quality of bone that we can repair and what kind of patients and patient numbers could benefit from these treatments.”

The Duke of York also visited the Hamlyn Centre for Robotic Surgery, part of the Institute of Global Health Innovation, involving researchers from across the College’s Faculties of Engineering and Medicine. There he witnessed a demonstration of the robotic technologies being developed by Imperial researchers to enhance the precision of surgery.

In the final strand of his visit The Duke heard about international partnerships that support the translation of Imperial expertise into practice and sustainable benefits in local healthcare. Expressing a desire to help develop the international aspect of Imperial’s work, he learnt about the Imperial College London Diabetes Centre in Abu Dhabi, the largest specialist medical centre in the United Arab Emirates dedicated to the treatment of diabetes, and the Qatar Biobank programme. Through this collaboration between Imperial, the Qatar Foundation, the Ministry of Health of Qatar and the Hamad Medical Corporation, a cohort of 100,000 Qatari nationals and residents is being recruited to collect health, lifestyle, metabolic and genomic data and biosamples to create a resource to support research into the leading causes of chronic diseases in the Gulf region. The Duke also received a briefing on the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine, Singapore’s third medical school due to open in 2013, which will train doctors able to meet the present and future needs of Singapore's healthcare system.