Panel II

Federal laboratories and Universities, by advancing medicine, technology, security, agriculture, and public health, play a critical role in improving quality of life. By helping transform research into innovation, TTOs ensure research is translated into accessible solutions to benefit humanity. It is common knowledge that TTO activities, while facilitating their agency mission, directly and indirectly contribute to economic, health, and other societal benefits. However, teasing out and assessing either quantitative or qualitative contributions of a TTO on economic, health, or other societal benefit is often very complex. This Panel will highlight some of the theory and current practices related to impact assessment as related to technology transfer, present some recent case studies, and discuss the pros and cons of different approaches.