When Solange Massa was doing her final year of medical training, she decided she “couldn’t just be a doctor using medieval tools” like the forceps she saw used to bring a baby into the world.

She became a translational scientist instead — bridging the gap between research and the patient to devise new ways of delivering medical care.

Now a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford, the Argentine-born inventor is an enthusiastic supporter of the university’s Office of Technology Licensing. The OTL automatically owns intellectual property developed with anything more “than incidental use” of its facilities — not counting, for example, access to a laptop or an office. After 15 per cent is deducted for costs, any royalties are split three ways between the inventor, their department, and the relevant school (Stanford comprises seven constituent schools).