Way, way back in the 1960s and 1970s, the NIDDK (National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, a unit of the National Institutes of Health [NIH]) ran a series of programs to promote the development of better treatments to address kidney failure.
Continue reading Spurring on Innovation for ESRD
When I tell folks that I really want our children to become comfortable with STEM, they (naturally) assume I want great courses in science, engineering, technology, and math. Sure, I do. As well as great programs in music, grammar (none of this BS ‘texting vernacular’), history, citizenship, and the rest. Because our kids need to be world citizens.
Continue reading How can we make STEM flower?
Serendipity. How trained minds recognize that something is different and, in so doing, solve a problem. Yes, I know that is not the definition you will find in a dictionary, which claims it means: the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way. Except the concept of serendipity universally occurs in science and technology, and my definition describes how it happens.
Continue reading Eureka or Serendipity?
One of the things I learned at MIT was how universities can increase their ability to provide scholarships and maintain their educational excellence. It wasn’t from the conventional academic process. No, these funds didn’t come from government grants for research. Because even back then, there wasn’t much (or any) excess in the funding that was provided by NIH, DOD, NSF, and the variety of alphabet agencies that support our educational research programs.
Continue reading Innovation Practicalities
I often work with companies helping them develop- and introduce- new products. There’s a litany of zany ideas- at least that’s what they were called when we first introduced them.
Continue reading Overnight success?
I really hate sounding like Chicken Little. But, given the intellectual and economic prowess of our Congress (that’s both the House and the Senate), I really have no choice. (Anyone else recognize the stupidity of bringing snowballs onto the floor to lambaste those who understand the import of global climate change?)
Continue reading Our Ostrich Behavior
Moore’s Law. 50 years old. It’s showing its age.
Sure, Murphy’s Law is the law better known to the younger (and older) set today. (That law states that anything that can go wrong will go wrong.)
Continue reading The Rate of Change- Moore or Less…
Stubborn. Determined. Disciplined. Persistent. All of these words say the same thing- even if some of them evoke negative connotations. And, the personality characteristics that underlie these words are critical to bring about change. (We also need to know when and if we need to stop being persistent- sometimes it is time to stop.)
Continue reading The year is half-over…What have you done so far?
I was going to write a completely different blog. No, it probably would have covered a lot of the same material- but the tone would have been different. Very different.
