We catalyze innovative life sciences discoveries for society

We aim to build a hands-on comprehensive and expertise driven incubator to support early technologies and innovative project with high potential in their path towards application, technology transfer and product development. Our vision is to advance and leverage technologies of the School of Life Sciences with the final goal to serve welfare of the society. Catalyze4Life is an innovation encouragement program. We design, support and tutor the validation of promising technologies and concepts and thereby we facilitate the path towards technology transfer and potential commercialization. We operate in close proximity with scientists and act upstream and in support of the missions of the Vice Presidency of Innovation and the Technology Transfer Office.

EPFL Life-sciences Start-up Social

May 4, 2023 from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. in SV 1717

Besides creating a ground for meeting like-minded people under one roof, the goal of the event is to understand the common needs of MedTech and BioTech start-ups and how they could still benefit from the EPFL ecosystem.

The outline of the event is as follows:

  • Welcome by Prof. Bart Deplancke, SV Vice-Dean of Innovation
  • Inspiring keynote lecture by Dr. André Mercanzini, Founder and CSO of Aleva Neurotherapeutics
  • Pitch session by innovative start-ups launched at EPFL
  • Interactive discussion panel with local stakeholders including Dr. Ursula Oesterle, EPFL Vice-President of Innovation
  • Networking cocktail

*Upon invitation only. Please contact [email protected].

Summer Series: Sarah Herrman is visiting Pierre Gönczy’s lab at EPFL from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her project looks at how the cell’s centrosomes help organize the polarity and function of the developing embryo. | © EPFL - Murielle Gerber

Our purpose

We support innovative projects and we educate to innovate.

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Innovators Forum

A new series of round table disucssion every other months, especially created for students to dialogue with industry experts.

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Educate for Life

We propose industrial R&D and business expertise and education through courses, seminars and workshops with volunteer industry experts.

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Recommended Courses

A list of courses by other universities or innovation stakeholders

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Toolbox for Innovation

R&D and Business expertise, Partnering, Funding, Education.

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Projects we support

Treatment for rare hematologic diseases, Cell therapy for cancer, Whole genome diagnostics, …

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Submit your Project

Interested in working with us? We encourage you to submit your ideas to us.

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Angela Madurga Alonso, a PhD student in immunology at EPFL, has won this year’s Isabelle Musy Award. © Alain Herzog/EPFL

“I wanted to do something that would make a positive impact”

— Angela Madurga Alonso, a PhD student in immunology at EPFL, has won this year’s Isabelle Musy Award for the curative treatment she came up with for cardiac fibrosis. She will use the prize money to further develop the treatment – which has proven to work in vitro – through a startup.

© 2023 Alithea Genomics Team

CHF 500,000 to boost Alithea Genomics RNA sequencing

— Alithea Genomics, an EPFL startup from the Laboratory of Systems Biology and Genetics, is active in high-throughput RNA sequencing, used to examine gene expression and discover new biomarkers and drugs. The Foundation for Technological Innovation (FIT) has chosen to support Alithea with a Tech Growth loan of CHF 500,000 to bring two new products to the market.

© iGEM EPFL 2022

EPFL places in the top ten at the 2022 iGEM competition

— With their biodegradable aerogel that can provide an alternative to conventional insulation materials, the EPFL team took home the gold along with four category nominations at this year’s iGEM synthetic biology competition, held in late October.

All news

SparkGlobal Logo | © SparkGlobal
Our partner

“Catalyze4Life follows the principles and quality standards that have been cornerstones of SPARK at Stanford. We are excited that C4L is now an official member of the SPARK Global network. We are looking forward to advancing projects together.”

– Prof. Daria Mochly-Rosen Director of the Stanford SPARK Translational Research Program

Contact

Vice-Dean for Innovation : Bart Deplancke

Office : SV 3823

Mail : [email protected]

Phone :  +41 21 69 31821

Program Director : Gautam Maitra

Mail : [email protected]  

Mailing address

EPFL School of Life Sciences
Station 19
CH-1015 Lausanne
Switzerland

How to get there

 

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