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From tracking anthrax to providing prosthetic limbs to amputee veterans, the presence of Fort Detrick has helped make the Frederick area a hotbed of innovative technology, some of which was on display Tuesday as several companies that have worked with the Army base showcased products and services at the Frederick Innovative Technology Center Inc. incubator.

The incubator staged the event in conjunction with the Fort Detrick Alliance and Fort Detrick Business Development Office. Both current and former incubator companies participated.

A total of 26 startups, including some incubator tenants, were part of the Fort Detrick Technology Transfer Initiative, which was completed this year by the Maryland Technology Development Corp. and Frederick County Office of Economic Development.The program resulted in $1.3 million in grants awarded to companies to develop technologies to address Army medical needs.

One of those companies was incubator tenant Foxspire, which received $50,000 to design and develop a system to track the base's stock of infectious agents, such as ebola and anthrax.

"They couldn't find any unique system to meet their needs," said David Rezvani, Foxspire's president and sole employee. "There's a lot of security and tracking involved."

Mac Heebner displayed products his incubator company, Kinetic Revolutions, offers to amputees, including military personnel.

Heebner, the CEO and an Army veteran, said Kinetic seeks to innovate prosthetic components "that haven't been innovated in years."

Kinetic, with four employees, works closely with Ability Prosthetics & Orthotics of Gettysburg, Pa., which has locations in Maryland, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Kentucky. Heebner called Ability "the cornerstone of our success."

He and Kinetic President Jeffrey M. Brandt, who also is COO of Ability, started Kinetic in January 2010. While Heebner said the company primarily is virtual, "when we grow — looking at next year — [we're] looking at bringing on a couple of biomedical and mechanical engineers and if we grow fast enough maybe ... a technical project manager."

Integrated BioTherapeutics, which graduated from the incubator in 2009 and now is in Gaithersburg, has developed vaccine programs for field viruses and conducts research for federal clients such as the Army Medical Research Insitute of Infections Diseases, the National Cancer Institute, the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda and the Department of Defense, said Todd Pelham, a business analyst with Integrated.

Integrated also offers therapeutic programs for conditions such as staph and strep infections and has grown to 32 employees, Pelham said. Integrated recently began a services division and can perform antiviral screenings for pharmaceutical companies.

"They should watch out for us," Pelham said of the attendees at Tuesday's event. "We're going to be a major player in the biodefense area."

Several other incubator companies exhibited, including Imagilin Technologies of Frederick, an incubator graduate that specializes in developing products and technology for human and animal health and nutrition, and TimberRock Energy Solutions, which promotes alternative energy technologies and products worldwide.

Having the event at the incubator "really shows off our clients very well," said Michael J. Dailey, the facility's executive director.

"The technologies here are amazing," Dailey said. "The feedback we've got was that ‘I didn't know that was happening here in Frederick County.'"

He said would like to see more focus on the amount of Fort Detrick resources available to entrepreneurs.

"Right now there are so many opportunities to commercialize technology that they're going elsewhere," Dailey said. "It can be done right here in Frederick where the technology was first developed."

chuntemann@gazette.net