Technology transfer.

Technology transfer has served the field of biomedical engineering well. Although the process is fraught with obstacles and may appear to be a distraction from more important work in the laboratory, application of technology is crucial to the furthering of the field and to public health in general. A given inventor may not want to take over the administrative tasks of protecting IP, developing a regulatory strategy, and developing a business model, and he or she does not necessarily have to; however, the inventor needs to at least know about the strategies and know there are people to turn to for leadership and guidance outside of the laboratory early in the process. And that can be all an inventor wants to do or can do: to simply turn the invention over to someone else and move on to more research in the hopes that the invention will help improve patients' health and perhaps afford the inventor and the research institution some financial reward. However, in turning an invention over completely, an inventor also loses power over how, for whom, and at what price the invention will be offered, and that is a reason to become more informed about the process, to know what you can ask for, and to stand by your invention's side in whatever capacity you are equipped to do so throughout the entire technology transfer process.