June 2, 2020
The year 2020 began dynamically for IIT researchers, despite the difficulties due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Research results of the European H2020 project iASiS are being exploited with the submission of two software patent applications by the Institute’s researchers and a new start-up opening its wings with the support of NCSR Demokritos.
The first patent application has been filled in January 2020 at the European Patent Office under the title: System and method for identifying drug-drug interactions.
The patent is led by SKEL lab researchers Fotis Aisopos, George Paliouras, Anastasios Nentidis and Kostas Bougiatiotis and relates to the identification of results in drug-drug interactions prediction for diseases such as Lung Cancer and Alzheimer’s through a technical pipeline of harvesting and indexing modules as well as machine learning tools. The specific invention provides an automatic tool that can provide a technical solution that replaces extensive manual experimentation by clinicians.
The second software patent which is soon to be submitted to the US Patent Office is also led by SKEL lab researchers Vassiliki Rentoumi and George Paliouras and is entitled: Cross lingual methodology for automatic assessment of neurodegenerative diseases.
This prototype has been developed for Textual Data Analysis helping measure cognitive awareness, namely CogAware. The CogAware submodule provides an accurate and robust risk assessment regarding Alzheimer’s disease, based on the textual samples of the patients when performing a specific task.
The latest start-up to have been supported by IIT and NCSR Demokritos is the newly founded LangAware. The company was established in October 2019 by Post-Doctoral researcher at SKEL Lab Dr. Vassiliki Rentoumi following the successful pilot studies deployed in day-care centers in Greece during the iASiS project. Through the android CogAware application, which has been created during the project, potential patients can be quickly and accurately screened for Alzheimer’s disease using Artificial Intelligence to predict neurodegenerative diseases. The company made a promising start by recently winning the first prize at Ennovation 2019 Awards which was conducted online in April 2020 in Athens. Dr. George Paliouras, Head of SKEL Lab at IIT is a scientific advisor to the company.