Spin-outs from German, British, Danish, Irish and Swiss are in the running for an Aces award.

Science|Business, a Belgium-based non-profit focused on bringing together research, industry and policy, has announced the shortlist for its sixth annual Academic Enterprise Awards (Aces). Aces are the only pan-European award recognising university spin-outs. The nine finalists are hailing from Germany, the UK, Denmark, Ireland and Switzerland.

Shortlisted for the Life Sciences Award are InSphero (ETH Zurich and Zurich University), Rhinix (Aarhus University) and TissUse (Technische Universität Berlin). InSphero’s technology enables in-vitro testing of drugs for efficacy and toxicity. Rhinix has developed unobtrusive nasal filters for people suffering from hay fever. TissUse creates chips that can test human reaction to drug candidates, cosmetics, and other consumer products.

The nominees for the Green Award are akvolution, DexLeChem (both from Technische Universität Berlin) and OxyMem (University College Dublin). Spin-out akvolution has figured out how to pretreat waters prone to algal bloons by using a desalination process based on ceramics. OxyMem uses membranes which oxygen can penetrate easily, so that the gas can be delivered more easily to bacteria in wastewater treatment.

Finally, ANavS (Technische Universität München), Brainomix (Oxford University) and pureLiFi (Edinburgh University) are competing for the ICT Award. ANavs provides low-cost positioning systems accurate to within centimetre range. Brainomix’s medical imaging software is able to analyse brain scans of stroke patients. The third nominee, pureLiFi, has developed next-generation WiFi technology which uses LED lighting to send data wirelessly.

Eoin Casey, associate professor at University College Dublin’s School of Chemical and Bioprocess Engineering said: “It is a great honour for OxyMem to be shortlisted for the prestigious Academic Enterprise Awards. I am delighted that the technology, which has resulted from research performed over the last decade in my laboratory, together with Eoin Syron, and which has been funded by Enterprise Ireland and Science Foundation Ireland, has now been translated into a commercial company with the potential to have a significant impact on the global wastewater treatment industry.”

The winners will be announced at the Innovation Connection conference at the Technische Universität Berlin on October 7th, 2014.