Pakistani researchers get US patent for drug monitoring device

Islamabad : The United States Patents and Trademark Office (USPTO) has allowed a patent to a team of researchers of COMSATS University Islamabad.

The patent recognises a novel microfluidics device invented by a team of researchers to enable therapeutic drug monitoring for terminally ill patients or those undergoing treatment from sensitive drugs which require real time monitoring to prevent over-dose.

The team comprising Dr. Madeeha Chaudry, Researcher, COMSATS University Islamabad, Dr. Malik Abdul Rehman, Prof. Dr. Raheel Qamar, Rector COMSATS University Islamabad and Prof. Dr. Arshad Saleem Bhatti, Dean Faculty of Sciences, COMSATS University Islamabad, was allowed the US-patent on their invention.

This US-patent is an outcome of the PhD research of Dr. Madeeha Chaudry which has led to a novel device for real time drug monitoring of patients undergoing therapeutic interventions using very minute amount of blood serum samples on the principle of microchip assay.

The inter-disciplinary research was carried out jointly by the Department of Physics and the Department of Biosciences at COMSATS University Islamabad.

The patent application incorporates data submitted as part of the Pakistani Patent Application No.339/2016 and will enable Pakistani researchers to commercialize their research in the United States. COMSATS University Islamabad is a leading public sector university of the Ministry of Science and Technology which has developed a comprehensive patent profile of over 21 US patents and 6 Pakistani patents under various stages of commercialization and submitted over 84 US-patent applications which are in various stages of evaluation and approval within a short span of time.

Prof. Dr. Raheel Qamar, Rector CUI congratulated the researchers and said that allowance of US-Patents on research work of his students was a global recognition of the potential of Pakistani research for innovation and commercialization. He said that the woes of the government can only be resolved, with sustainable and incremental investments in the higher education of the country.

Prof. Dr. Raheel Qamar said that the Prime Minister’s National Taskforce under the able leadership of Prof. Atta-ur-Rahman is trying to divert the much needed resources to the innovation landscape of Pakistan and making policy and infrastructural intervention for improving ease of doing business, as well as showcasing Pakistani research and development capacity, in order draw benefit to the immense technical and vibrant human resource available in the country.