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Contact: Joan Schwartz (617) 353-4626 [email protected]
PHOTODETECTION SYSTEMS EMERGES FROM PHOTONICS INCUBATOR
Venture Funding Will Lead to More Effective Cancer Screening
(Boston, Mass.) - PhotoDetection Systems, Inc., a company that was recently spun-out from the Boston University Photonics Center, has received a first round of venture funding in the amount of $2.75 million. The company, generated from technology developed at the Photonics Center, will be leaving the Center's Business Incubator for a 10,000 square foot facility in Acton, Mass.
PhotoDetection Systems is developing advanced, low-cost, three-dimensional medical imaging systems that can detect very small tumors and determine whether or not they are malignant. The device, which employs a highly sensitive gamma camera for Positron Emission Tomography (PET), can also determine to which stage cancer has progressed, speeding up the process of providing physicians with information vital for the design of a treatment plan. The company expects to have a working prototype within one year.
The company is based on technology developed by Dr. William Worstell when he was a member of the faculties of the physics department and the Photonics Center at Boston University. He now serves as Chief Technical Officer of PhotoDetection Systems.
"Our technology dramatically improves the resolution and sensitivity of PET images at a significantly lower cost," says Worstell. "It will enable more clinicians to detect smaller lesions earlier, thereby improving the survival rates of many patients."
Incubation at the Photonics Center has been invaluable in getting the company up and running, according to company President and CEO Paul Domigan. "The Photonics Business Incubator not only provided us with access to the state-of-the-art equipment and facilities that are essential for a high-tech start-up, but also put us in touch with a network of industrial and financial contacts that are key to our successful growth."
Photonics Center Director Don Fraser considers the funding of PhotoDetection Systems an important milestone in fulfilling the Center's mission. "Our mission is to accelerate the commercial development of advanced photonics technologies by bringing together ideas, expertise, and resources from within and outside the University to create real products and real businesses. The emergence of PhotoDetection Systems from the Photonics Incubator is a real indicator of our success in redefining the relationship between business and academia."
For further information:
PhotoDetection Systems, Inc. http://www.photodetection.com/
The Boston University Photonics Center http://www.bu.edu/photonics/
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June 26, 2000
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