Union Minister for Science & Technolgy and Earth Sciences, Shri Kapil Sibal today gave away the CSIR Technology Award 2008 for Life Sciences to ‘Team CCMB’ of the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad; CSIR Technology Award 2008 for Innovation to ‘Team CDRI’ of the Central Drug Research Institute, Lucknow and CSIR Technology Award 2008 for Business Development & Technology Marketing to ‘Team URDIP’ of the Unit for Research and Development of Information Products, Pune.

‘Team CCMB’ has won the award for developing novel universal technique to establish the identity of enormous number of animal species for forensic applications. Developed technique is based on polymerase chain reaction (PCR), which without knowing the history of a forensic sample, is able to reveal whether the source of the sample is human or animal, and if animal which animal. The technique is simple and uses one set of novel primers to amplify and sequence the PCR amplicons. The molecular technique can be applied universally with a tiny piece of meat/drop of blood or even a single hair originated from any of the thousands of species of animals including any of the threatened and/or endangered animal. International patents have been obtained for this innovation.

‘Team CDRI’ has won the awards for discovery of guggulsterone and development of analogues with novel mechanism of action as hypolipidemic agents. The innovation involves development of a potent lipid lowering formulation to fight the widely prevalent metabolic syndrome encompassing hyperlipidemia, insulin resistance, diabetes and hypertension. Several structural analogs of Guggulsterone have been designed and synthesized following lead from Gugulipid. The most active Guggulsterone analogue has under gone appropriate biological profiling through regulatory pharmacology, toxicity and pharmacokinetics. Phase III multi-centric clinical trials for efficacy evaluation in patients of hyperlipidemia is under progress in collaboration with Cadilla Pharma, Ahmedabad. CDRI has secured several patents on the development.

‘Team URDIP’ has won the award for creating the niche in the knowledge based service sector. URDIP has designed, developed and provided value added information services in the areas of Patinformatics, Phytoinformatics and Toxinformatics. URDIP is involved in the pre-research and pre-development phase of the research projects. The output of URDIP’s services is used by clients to identify new emerging applications, new directions for product development, discover trends in competing technology approaches and competitor watch. These studies enable companies to drive their research strategy and innovation. Over the years URDIP has acquired an excellent stature in Patinformatics and there services are sought by several research institutions, small, medium & large enterprises and multinationals. URDIP has registered a sustainable commutative growth of over 65% in the last three years.

CSIR Technology Awards, given annually, were instituted in 1990 with a view to foster and encourage in-house multidisciplinary team efforts and external interaction for technology development, transfer, marketing and commercialization. The award carries a cash prize of Rs. 2 lakh, a plaque and a citation in each category.

Source: Press Information Bureau
Date: 26 September, 2008