We are delighted to announce our latest ‘I’ve got an idea Fund‘ award to Nicole Hakim who recently completed a Masters in Biodesign at Central Saint Martins.

Nicole explains the twin problem that she’s motivated to address. On the one hand, 40% of caught fish is classified as waste and poorly disposed of. On the other hand, thousands of disposable contact lenses are flushed down the toilet everyday releasing polluting microplastic particles into our rivers and seas. Nicole has been experimenting with extracting collagen from fish waste without the requirement for toxic chemicals or high temperatures and then developing a collagen hydrogel material that can be used for biocompatible applications in the contact lens industry.

Our Fund will enable Nicole to carry out her next crucial set of lab experiments optimising a scaled collagen extraction process and improving the hydrogel material properties for contact lens application.

We liked the inventiveness and ambition of Nicole’s project and the progress she has already made. We also always like to support people carrying out their own experimentation (be it lab, field or kitchen table) to see if their ideas work, learn and evolve them and have fun in the process. We look forward to following Nicole’s fish eye journey.