Editorial Staff , 2025-04-15 07:20:00
Skin and wound healing research expert and entrepreneur receives the main 2025 NovaUCD Innovation Award
The recipients of University College Dublin’s (UCD) annual innovation awards, which highlight successes made in areas of knowledge transfer, consultancy, entrepreneurship and the promotion of an innovation culture, by members of the UCD research, innovation and entrepreneurial community, have been announced today by NovaUCD.
A total of seven Awards, including the main 2025 NovaUCD Innovation Award which was awarded to Professor Wenxin Wang, a leading skin and wound healing research expert and entrepreneur, were presented by Professor Orla Feely, President, UCD during an event held in the UCD University Club.
Speaking at the event Professor Orla Feely, UCD, President, said, “UCD is committed to delivering impact from our leading research and innovation across a broad range of disciplines. The NovaUCD Innovation Awards, which have become a key annual event, recognise the achievements of our research, innovation and entrepreneurial communities and demonstrate our strength in developing talent and creating and applying knowledge to deliver impact.
I congratulate all who have received this year’s Awards and wish the Awardees every future success as they continue to deliver impact in Ireland and further afield through their commercialisation, consultancy, entrepreneurial and innovation activities.”
Pictured at University College Dublin is Professor Wenxin Wang, recipient of the 2025 NovaUCD Innovation Award. Pic: Paul Sharp/SHARPPIX
Professor Wang is a Research Ireland Principal Investigator at the UCD Charles Institute of Dermatology, UCD School of Medicine. His academic and research expertise is focused on areas of biomaterials, stem cell and gene therapy for the treatments of skin wounds, cartilage/bone regeneration, including dental tissue regeneration.
Professor Wang’s intellectual property portfolio includes 12 invention disclosures to NovaUCD, being a named inventor on 30+ patents during his career, and launching and commercialising multiple developed technologies onto the market.
He is also a serial entrepreneur and the founder of three start-up companies, including Vornia which was acquired by Ashland in 2018, Bláfar, and Branca Bunús a UCD spin-out biotech company which he founded in 2019. Branca Bunús is focused on developing and commercialising polymer-based gene therapies for patients suffering from genetic disorders.
He has also developed strong links with industry partners, which includes collaborating with Amryt Pharma, Curran Scientific Ltd and DEBRA Ireland on an €8+ million DTIF funded project focused on the development of a disruptive gene therapy platform to replace viruses in the treatment of genetic conditions, such EB (Epidermolysis Bullosa).
On receiving the 2025 NovaUCD Innovation Award, Professor Wenxin Wang, said, “I am delighted to receive this Award from NovaUCD as my dream and passion is always within innovation and scientific discovery, using my talents with an ultimate goal of translating my scientific discovery into real-world applications to benefit humankind. In the years ahead I will keep pursuing this life mission of mine.”
Among the other Awards presented were the Invention of the Year and the Consultancy of the Year Awards.
The recipients of the 2025 NovaUCD Invention of the Year Award are, Dr Emer Doheny, UCD School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering and Dr Jayne Carberry, UCD School of Medicine.
They received the Award for a novel medical device, which they have developed and designed, that allows for the measurement and training of individual oropharyngeal muscles using a moveable oral sensor. Their invention, which has been patented, has a number of potential clinical applications to address medical conditions, such as dysphagia, or difficulties in swallowing, associated with neurodegenerative disease, and respiratory sleep disorders including obstructive sleep apnoea.
Dr Doheny said, “We are honoured to receive this prestigious Award for our medical device invention which was the result of research funded under an internal UCD STEM challenge project. Our project, which combined the expertise of myself and Jayne in clinical and biomedical engineering, was focused on developing a solution to help people who suffer from respiratory sleep disorders and medical conditions associated with dysphagia.”
Dr Jayne Carberry added, “Our next steps are to secure funding to perform further validation studies of our medical device. These validation studies will incorporate gamification and personalised therapy using AI, and our focus is to ultimately find new digital biomarkers related to dysphagia and obstructive sleep apnoea and to then explore the commercialisation opportunities through NovaUCD.”
The recipient of the 2025 NovaUCD Consultancy of the Year Award is Dr Siobhan Mullan, Chair in Animal Welfare and Veterinary Ethics at the UCD School of Veterinary Medicine.
A veterinary surgeon, Dr Mullan previously worked in mixed and companion animal practice but has now transitioned away from clinical work to focus on research and teaching to deliver large scale, long-term impactful improvements in animal welfare.
Pictured at University College Dublin is Dr Siobhan Mullan, recipient of the 2025 NovaUCD Consultancy of the Year Award. Pic: Paul Sharp/SHARPPIX
Since joining UCD in 2021 she has undertaken several consultancy projects, through ConsultUCD, and transferred her expertise to deliver long-term impactful improvements in animal welfare to clients in Ireland, Australia, the UK, Thailand, Indonesia, France and North America.
Dr Mullan is also a strong advocate and supporter of ConsultUCD within her School and within the UCD College of Health and Agricultural Sciences.
On receiving the 2025 NovaUCD Consultancy of the Year Award, Dr Mullan, said, “I am both surprised and delighted in equal measure to have received this Award. The thing I really enjoy about consultancy work is collaborating with incredible people on science-led initiatives to make real-world changes to improve animal lives. I’m so very grateful for the support of the UCD School of Veterinary Medicine, and to ConsultUCD, whose service is second to none.”
The other four recipients of the 2025 NovaUCD Innovation Awards are:
2025 NovaUCD Spin-out of the Year Award: LaNua Medical, co-founders, Tom Fitzmaurice, Dr Cormac Farrelly, UCD School of Medicine, Dr Eoin O’Cearbhaill and Sajjad Amiri, UCD School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering
2025 NovaUCD Licence of the Year Award: Professor Peter Kennedy, UCD School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
2025 NovaUCD CEO of the Year Award: Mike McGearty, Meili
2025 NovaUCD Innovation Champion of the Year Award: Professor Kevin O’Connor, BiOrbic, Research Ireland Centre for Bioeconomy and UCD School of Biomolecular and Biomedical Science.