This is what a cardiovascular surgeon does every day:

“I use energy, I navigate hollow tubes through a structure to a target, I access the target and once I access that target, I am involved in maintaining volume flow from point A to point B.”

Seem similar to the energy biz? Dr. Alan B. Lumsden, medical director at Houston Methodist DeBakey Heart & Vascular Center, agrees and has seized the opportunity to find common ground and share his industry’s knowledge with technology leaders in energy and space exploration.

“Sometimes we take the pump out and it’s called a heart transplant, but the bottom line is that many of the analytical tools that we use are very similar to the tools that you use,” Lumsden told his audience at an OTC topical breakfast. The forum focused on the “Pumps & Pipes” program that encourages cooperation between the medical and energy industries to develop innovative technologies.

The ongoing brainstorming session between energy and medicine isn’t new. The Greenfield Kimray filter from the 1960s was developed to be placed into the inferior vena cava to shield the heart and lungs from blood clots. It is based on drillers’ deployment of a “junk basket” to retain debris during well work.

“Many of the solutions to my problems have already been found,” Lumsden said. All that is needed to find those answers is the ability to rummage around “the other guy’s toolkit.”

The collaboration is more than pure science, though. Without attention to the potential to add value, the alliance won’t go anywhere, warned Rustom K. Mody, Baker Hughes’ vice president and chief engineer for enterprise technology.

“Every innovation has to create value,” Mody said, listing three essential principles for putting ideas into practice:

  • Unlock market potential;
  • Reduce risk; and
  • Increase efficiency.

“If any one of these is missing, that technology is not going make traction in the marketplace, because if it is not really valuable to clients, this technology is not going to be used in this industry or in any industry,” he said.

Mody advised research manager to keep in mind some basics. For example, lose the dream of “build it and they will come.”

“You’ve got to understand the market potential for what you’re working on before you embark on the journey,” he said.

For that matter, forget about serendipity. Anything new and worthwhile will be based on sound fundamentals which require a plan. And Mody insisted that anyone wishing to expand knowledge must associate with people who do great things. It’s no coincidence that “Pumps & Pipes” formed in Houston, where leaders in medicine, oil and gas, and space exploration are based.

A number of strategic incentives have come into play during the partnership, wrote William E. Kline, drilling and subsurface manager for ExxonMobil, in a white paper. Among them:

  • Access: because they are not in competition with each other, doctors and engineers have no inhibitions in their collaboration and fresh eyes are seen as an advantage, not a threat;
  • Discovery: truly breakthrough accomplishments happen when completely new approaches are employed, as opposed to routine developments necessary to keep up with the state of the art;
  • Benchmarking by analogy: visualizing flow through a heart valve and translating it to flow through a gravel pack; and
  • Cascading leverage: innovation materializes as possibilities are presented, like deepwater drilling and synthetic biomaterials and the possibilities of nanoscience.

The potential for this cooperation appears to be boundless.

“Collaboration across industries,” Mody said, “is going to be the next competitive advantage.”