A team of materials chemist students from the University of Colorado, Boulder (CU-Boulder), won a $10,000 prize for its development of a new plastic that they say could reduce the fabrication time and cost of O&P devices. The team, Malleable Medical Tech, tied for first place and split the $20,000 awarded in the university’s New Venture Challenge, a cross-campus entrepreneurship competition.
The plastic, called malleable polymers, is twice as strong and can be molded at half the temperature of traditional plastics, according to Philip Taynton, one of the team’s founders, and could “revolutionize the world of orthopedic and prosthetic devices,” he told Xconomy. Taynton said that he expects O&P devices made with the material will cost 25 percent less than those made using current methods and could be completed in as little as ten minutes.
