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<span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Coming in at #21 in total funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) among all universities, UAB has a [http://www.report.nih.gov/award/index.cfm?ot=DH,27,47,4,52,64,10000,MS,20,16,6,13,10,49,53,86,OTHDH&fy=2015&state=&ic=&fm=&orgid=&distr=&rfa=&om=n&pid= substantial] amount of resources (over $220 million from the NIH alone) for faculty to pursue innovation in a research context. Faculty are encouraged to pursue ideas and are frequently recognized for their innovative work both on-campus, by campus-wide publications such as [https://www.uab.edu/uabmagazine/ UAB Magazine] and the [http://www.uab.edu/reporter/ Reporter], and off, by news features at the local, regional, and national levels.</span></span>
<span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">With Birmingham’s entrepreneurial landscape exploding in the last few years, UAB has recently begun developing partnerships with leaders in the entrepreneurial community, as evidenced by the collaboration between the Innovation Depot (a local startup incubator) and the Collat School of Business to form the iLab, a student business incubator. These partnerships provide opportunities for both students and faculty to gain the tools needed to potentially launch their products into the market.</span></span>
<span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">But herein lies the metaphorical albatross around our neck—the intellectual property (IP) rights of students and faculty, not just at UAB but across the entire University of Alabama system, are non-existent. Quoted from the University of Alabama System’s Office of Technology Transfer (OTT), “When University support makes the research effort possible or when it provides support for the development of a patentable invention, it is reasonable for the University to participate in the fruits of such development, including reimbursement for its costs.” IP rights reform is needed to ensure that both our students and faculty are encouraged to innovate and disseminate their innovations into market at large.</span></span>