The University of Valencia presented the MOTIVEM 2024 Awards, awarding prizes to the most innovative ideas jointly developed by students and teachers of the University of Valencia.
A personal device to monitor foetal heart rate, an application to design diets with strict nutritional values, a dressing to detect complications in pressure ulcers in frail older adults in rural areas, a pill to detect colorectal cancer, and an initiative to facilitate business collaboration and job transition for elite athletes are the ideas awarded prizes in this edition.
MOTIVEM is an innovative programme organised by the University of Valencia through its ADEIT Foundation, under the direction of the Vice-Principal for Innovation and Transfer, with the sponsorship of the Generalitat Valenciana and the collaboration of the ‘la Caixa’ Foundation, through CaixaBank.
In this edition, a total of 167 business ideas were presented, with the participation of 700 students and 151 teaching staff members from the University of Valencia. Participation in MOTIVEM has grown once again this year, both in terms of the number of ideas presented, 11% more than in 2023, and in terms of students and teaching staff. Likewise, as in previous years, participation in the MOTIVEM Awards has come from of all the faculties and centres of the University of Valencia.
The award ceremony, led by the secretary of the MOTIVEM Academic Council, Emilia Matallana, was attended by Jaime Casas, director of Institutions in the Valencian Community at CaixaBank; Javier Oliver, director general of the Valencian Agency for Assessment and Foresight (AVAP); Ester Olivas, director general of Entrepreneurship and Internationalisation; Rosa María Donat, Vice-Principal for Innovation and Transfer and director of the MOTIVEM programme; María Vicenta Mestre, Principal of the University of Valencia; and Ángela Pérez, President of the Social Council of the University of Valencia and of the ADEIT Foundation.
During the award ceremony, the principal of the University of Valencia, María Vicenta Mestre, emphasised the work of the teaching staff in this project and encouraged the group of students participating in this edition not to lose their enthusiasm and to continue with their projects. ‘We are going to help you to make these projects a reality in order to achieve a better quality of life and a better society,’ said the principal.
In the same vein, the president of the Social Council and ADEIT, Ángela Pérez, thanked the teaching staff and students for their work in MOTIVEM, while announcing ADEIT’s commitment to entrepreneurship. ‘We are going to continue working to bring about the projects of the students that have an entrepreneurial nature’, she said.
Architecture and Engineering
In Architecture and Engineering, the MOTIVEM 2024 award went to a personal foetal heart rate monitoring device with integrated an algorithm that reliably assesses foetal well-being, called ‘Embrioncillos’. This idea has been developed by the students Aránzazu Carbonell Molina, Blanca Carreras Gamón, Laura Gregori Navarro and Alba Verdú García, from the Faculty of Medicine and Odontology; and José Manuel García Núñez, from the School of Engineering, and coordinated by Professor César Lizán Tudela, from the Faculty of Medicine and Odontology.
Science
The idea ‘Nutriest’ has received the award in the Science category. Coordinated by Professor Sergio López Ureña, from the Faculty of Mathematics, this idea aims to facilitate the design of diets through various algorithms. The rest of the team is made up of the students Luis Carrillo Hernández, Tonio Janek Kowalke Jeri and Luca Tanganelli Castrillón, from the Faculty of Mathematics; and David Medina Mompó and Mercedes Taroncher Ruiz, from the Faculty of Pharmacy and Food Sciences.
Social Sciences and Law
The idea ‘Elevated Sports Retirement’, an initiative that facilitates business collaboration and the job transition of elite athletes with specialised training and comprehensive advice, was the winner of the Social and Legal Sciences branch. It has been developed by the students Rubén Bruna Lázar and Esther Sánchez Ribes, from the Faculty of Physical Education and Sport Sciences; Paula Mateu Blau and Antoni Molla Benavent, from the Faculty of Economics; and coordinated by the lecturer Alberto Encarnación Martínez, from the Faculty of Physical Education and Sport Sciences.
Health Sciences
In the Health Sciences branch, two teams, ‘Fisioaging’ and ‘Nano-Answer’ have been awarded the prize equally. The first idea, coordinated by Consuelo Borrás Blasco, from the Faculty of Medicine and Odontology, and made up of students Marta Arnal Forné, José de Santiago Montesinos and Javier Huete Acevedo from the same centre, consists of a thymol blue dressing to detect pressure ulcer complications in frail older adults in rural areas.
The second idea, ‘Nano-Answer’, developed by the students Noelia Megías Ruano, Ben Okkema, Héctor Pastor Gracia, from the Faculty of Biological Sciences; Clara Revert Giménez, from the Faculty of Nursing and Podiatry, with the coordination of the lecturer María Jesús García Murria, from the Faculty of Biological Sciences, consists of a colorectal cancer screening pill; a reliable, safe and affordable method that can be performed at home.
