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Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a leading cause of death and long-term disability in young people. However, research in this area remains limited in particular due to a lack of data concerning head injuries sustained by the young population. An innovative longitudinal study designed and conducted by The Podium Institute is harnessing advanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques to uncover why some children recover worse than others after they have…
Life science companies have traditionally kept patients and consumers at arm’s length. Pharmaceutical, biotech, and medtech companies have viewed providers and payers, not patients, as their key customers and have rarely interacted with them as end customers. This approach has had to evolve in recent years. Consumers are now accustomed to apps and smartwatches that provide a 360-degree view of their well-being, and they engage with direct-to-consumer brands such as…
This commentary originally appeared in Corporate Board Member. As the 2025 proxy season launches, dual-class shares may once again become a common target of proxy ratings firms and activist investors. These reflexive critics miss the reality that dual-class shares can often be a vital protector of shareholder value and allow vital structural advantages such as: More efficient capital allocation: Unlike virtually every peer, Berkshire Hathaway under Warren Buffett has never…
As artificial intelligence continues to rapidly evolve, Stanford’s AI Playground provides a convenient environment for faculty, staff, and students to experiment with AI technology.Earlier this year, University IT began piloting the AI Playground, a Stanford-hosted environment that allows users to test out and compare a range of AI tools, including ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and Wolfram. As of Oct. 1, the AI Playground is accessible to all Stanford faculty, staff, students,…
Quick Hits The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky vacated the U.S. Department of Education’s 2024 Title IX Final Rule, which had expanded the definition of sex-based harassment to include sexual orientation, gender identity, sex stereotypes, and pregnancy. The court found that the 2024 Title IX Final Rule violated the First Amendment and the Spending Clause of the United States Constitution, and it exceeded the U.S. Department…
The group of bacteria called Enterobacteriaceae, including Klebsiella pneumoniae, Shigella, E.coli and others, is present at low levels as part of a healthy human gut microbiome. But at high levels - caused for example by increased inflammation in the body, or by eating contaminated food - these bugs can cause illness and disease. In extreme cases, too much Enterobacteriaceae in the gut can be life-threatening.Researchers have used computational approaches including…
10 January 2025By Arnaud DyèvreThis is the third post in our series featuring work submitted to the ECB’s 2024 Young Economist Prize. Arnaud Dyèvre was selected as one of the finalists with the research highlighted in this post. Applications for the 2025 Prize will be open from 13 January to 12 February 2025. For more details, go to the dedicated webpage.Investments in R&D typically foster productivity growth. But the funding…
Despite dedicated efforts across the biopharmaceutical industry to streamline clinical development, clinical trials remain complex, costly, and time-consuming. These challenges are compounded by an increasingly competitive and crowded trial landscape. Yet accelerating clinical development remains crucial—not just for patients but for the enterprise. A 12-month reduction in the clinical development timeline can add more than $400 million in net present value (NPV) across a sponsor’s portfolio while delivering immeasurable benefits to…
With regard to passenger transit, the agreements between the EU and the Russian Federation are formalised in the form of a joint statement, which is not binding. In fact, the legal basis for Kaliningrad passenger transit consists of EU law, which can be changed at any time. There is an agreement between Russia and Lithuania on the issuing of a facilitated transit document , which is based on the provisions…
We are in a moment of vast potential in life sciences—of diversified investments, breakthrough discoveries, and rapid expansion of therapeutics into new modalities and platforms. And AI is increasingly enabling data-driven decision-making across the product life cycle, from AI-supported drug candidate selection to real-time clinical trial site monitoring. However, overall industry productivity—whether measured in terms of speed, cost-effectiveness, or ROI—has been stagnant for decades. While there are undoubtedly multiple causes…
Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images Generative artificial intelligence is transforming how candidates prepare for interviews, making it more complicated for hiring managers to accurately assess their true expertise. By inputting role-specific details, organizational information, and their resumes into GenAI tools, candidates can prompt the technology to generate potential interview questions along with personalized answers. In fact, recruiters, consultants, and other job seekers widely recommend preparing for interviews in this…
Quick Hits The Court of Appeal for Ontario highlighted three key points in Dufault v. Ignance (Township): the ESA is intended to protect employee interests; courts should interpret termination of employment clauses such that employers comply with the ESA; and the wording of termination clauses will determine that interpretation. The court also held that if the termination clause in an employment agreement does not comply with the ESA when it…
By Algernon Percy | 09 Jan, 2025 The outlook for interest rates Bond yields have risen markedly. Given that the economic and political prospects in the UK and the US have diverged so markedly in the last three months, it is perhaps surprising that 10-year gilt and US treasury yields have ended the year at almost identical levels – 4.56% and 4.57% respectively. Moreover, they have moved on a broadly…
Q: How does Harrison Street approach investing? Harrison Street is a traditional investment manager in the sense that we raise capital that we deploy by executing real estate strategies. What differentiates us is our demographic focus. Instead of the traditional commercial real estate sectors—office, retail, multi-family, industrial, or lodging—we look at areas with relatively inelastic demand tied to people moving through cycles in their life. Instead of multifamily, we invest…
Amid growing complexities, escalating costs, and a heightened demand for innovative therapies, biopharmaceutical R&D organizations are under pressure to find ways to boost their productivity. Preclinical studies are increasingly using diverse assays, complex “omics” data, and humanized models to evaluate drug candidates. Clinical trials are adopting new trial designs and incorporating personalized-medicine approaches and even more end points. In this challenging environment, pharma leaders are turning to advanced technologies such…
A paper detailing the research published Dec. 23 in Nature Biomedical Engineering. McLaughlin and Snyder are co-senior authors. Ahmed Metwally, PhD, a former postdoctoral scholar at Stanford Medicine who is now a research scientist at Google, is the lead author. Delineating details of diabetes Currently, diagnosing diabetes is based solely on the level of glucose in the blood and can be made through a simple blood draw. “But those tests…
The letter highlights the role that the Greater Cambridge region – which generates over £50bn of turnover per year for the UK – can play in driving national economic growth. The signatories set out the ambitions and opportunities which the region offers, and a sense of unity of purpose.Open New Year Letter 2025 If science were a country then Cambridge would likely be its capital, and if discovery were a…
Quick Hits A recent federal court ruling in Tennessee found that NCAA eligibility rules regarding two-year college transfers likely violate federal antitrust law, granting a former junior college quarterback an additional year to play in Division I football. The court recognized that the NCAA holds monopsony power over college athletes, limiting the labor market for players and impacting their eligibility and competition among schools. The decision is part of a…
Political, security and identity reasons are the motives underlying the collective West’s policy of regime change. The Western powers, led by the USA, through NATO, seek to diminish the power of challengers. They seek to assert the collective West’s political identity and economic interests by keeping rising states in a subordinate position, David Lane writes.As the armed conflict between NATO/Ukraine and Russia comes to a conclusion, attention turns to its…
Happy New Year! Now that we’re all back to the grind, let’s talk about January’s reputation as the least productive month of the year. The post-holiday slump is real – teams return to work with noticeably less pep in their step. This time of year can feel like you’re trying to light a fire with damp wood. You’ve just wrapped up holiday celebrations, year-end reviews, and goal-setting for the new…
The journey to bring new medicines to market remains long and costly, despite recent technological and process improvements in biopharma R&D. It takes about a decade, on average, from candidate nomination to launch, and study and application costs for investigational new drugs (INDs) have soared in recent years by 20–30 percent.These challenges stem partly from the growing complexity of research and early development, fueled by an explosion of data and…
Brazilian farmers have endured multiple challenges since 2023, including crop failures, commodity price declines, and intensified droughts, rain, and wildfires. The result is greater caution, with two-thirds of producers expecting profits to remain stable or decrease in 2024, according to a McKinsey survey. Rising input costs were Brazilian farmers’ main concern when surveyed two years ago, but now extreme weather events are seen as the biggest threat. And to navigate…
Topics Column Our expert columnists offer opinion and analysis on important issues facing modern businesses and managers. More in this series subscribe-icon Subscribe Share Carolyn Geason-Beissel/MIT SMR | Getty Images This is the time of year for predictions and trend analyses, and as data science and artificial intelligence become increasingly important to the global economy, it’s vital that leaders watch emerging AI trends. Nobody seems to use AI to make…
A framework for addressing loneliness in the workplace for enhanced well-being Addressing loneliness and fostering a sense of belonging is not just a moral imperative but a strategic necessity for organisations striving to cultivate a resilient, engaged, and high-performing workforce. To tackle this issue, we propose a holistic framework comprising five key elements: Culture, Leadership, DEIB & Well-being, Organisational Design & Workplace Environment, and Social Needs & Networks. This framework…
Quick Hits The Working for Workers Five Act, 2024 amended the Occupational Health and Safety Act’s (OHSA) definition of “industrial establishment” to exclude any office in a private residence. However, this does not mean the OHSA does not apply to private residences. The Working for Workers Five Act, 2024 also amended the OHSA to apply to telework “performed in or about a private residence.” Simply put, the OHSA applies to…
On Dec. 19, 2024, the Office of the Alberta Superintendent of Insurance published a revised version of Interpretation Bulletin No. 05-2024 (the Superintendent’s Revised Bulletin) setting out the Superintendent’s position with respect to products commonly marketed by automobile dealerships in conjunction with the sale of motor vehicles. The original Bulletin published by the Superintendent has not substantively changed, and was previously summarized in an article by BLG found here. The Superintendent’s…
Professor Binney follows in the footsteps of Arthur Eddington, Albert Einstein, Edwin Hubble, Stephen Hawking, and Jocelyn Bell Burnell in receiving the Society’s highest honour, which dates back 200 years. Since 1964, two Gold Medals have been awarded each year: one for astronomy, and one for geophysics.Professor Binney said: ‘I am delighted to be honoured by the RAS by the award of this year's Gold Medal. It was my great good…
During the past five years, healthcare stakeholders’ expectations of sources of industry growth and profits have shifted toward alternative subsegments. For example, healthcare services and technology (HST) subsegments, which represented about $65 billion in earnings in 2023, will experience an estimated 9 percent CAGR during the next five years. By comparison, payer profit pools (about $55 billion in 2023) will have an estimated 7 percent CAGR during the same period.…
For the first time, the method provides a robust scientific framework for evaluating identification techniques, especially when dealing with large-scale data. This could include, for instance, monitoring how accurate advertising code and invisible trackers are at identifying online users from small pieces of information such as time zone or browser settings (a technique called ‘browser fingerprinting’). Lead author Dr Luc Rocher, Senior Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, part of…
On a Saturday morning a week before her fall quarter finals, Stanford senior Ursula Neuner found herself talking about bison.Specifically, Neuner discussed the case of Clifford Walters, who, while visiting Yellowstone National Park in May 2023, rescued a newborn bison from drowning after spotting the distressed calf, separated from its mother, struggling to cross a river. His well-intended efforts were ultimately harmful and futile: the calf was rejected by its…
8 January 2025By Morgane RichardThis is the second post in our series featuring work submitted to the ECB’s 2024 Young Economist Prize. Morgane Richard was selected as one of the finalists with the research highlighted in this post. Applications for the 2025 Prize will be open from 13 January to 12 February 2025. For more details, go to the dedicated webpage.The rise of working-from-home during the pandemic dramatically changed the…
Quick Hits On July 31, 2024, Governor Maura Healey signed into law legislation requiring Massachusetts employers with one hundred or more employees and subject to EEO-1 reporting obligations to provide a pay report to Massachusetts by February 1 of each year. Covered employers are required to complete their EEO-1 pay reporting by February 1, 2025. Massachusetts has not yet issued guidance on how exactly this reporting will be completed, but…
On December 12, 2024, the Ontario government launched a consultation for the regulations (the Consultation) under Ontario’s new consumer protection legislation. On December 6, 2023, the new Consumer Protection Act, 2023 (the New CPA) received Royal Assent as part of the Bill 142, the Better for Consumers, Better for Businesses Act, 2023. The substance of the New CPA will be detailed in the Proposed Regulations. Once in force, the New…
We are relatively cautious about what we buy when the stakes are high. But do we apply the same level of scrutiny to the most important investments of our lives – choosing a partner or a career path? Divorce and turnover rates suggest not. While we won’t weigh in on the complexities of marriage, as career advisors and coaches, we know that cultural misalignment is the primary reason why people leave…
At a glance The ‘empowerment line’ measures progress toward a world where everyone’s essential needs are met. About 40 percent of the global population lives above the empowerment line—they can afford a standard basket of essential goods and services and begin to save. The rest live below the line, mostly in lower- and middle-income economies where GDP growth is the main driver of empowerment. At higher GDP levels, income inequality…
Topics Artificial Intelligence and Business Strategy The Artificial Intelligence and Business Strategy initiative explores the growing use of artificial intelligence in the business landscape. The exploration looks specifically at how AI is affecting the development and execution of strategy in organizations. In collaboration with More in this series Get updates by email Please enter a valid email address Thank you for signing up Privacy Policy After trying his luck at…
The ownership, use, and monetization of produced water have rapidly transformed what was once a liability into a valuable asset, creating significant legal and economic uncertainty for operators and landowners alike. With advancements in water recycling technologies and operators discovering new revenue opportunities from produced water byproducts, disputes surrounding produced water are intensifying. This article examines the multifaceted legal and economic issues surrounding produced water, including legislative developments, ongoing litigation,…
Quick Hits Italy introduced new parental leave benefits, effective January 1, 2024. Singapore expanded paternity leave benefits and undertook comprehensive workplace fairness legislation. China (Shanghai) implemented penalties for unequal pay in labor dispatch. Brazil and the European Union (EU) focused on gender pay equity with new reporting obligations. Middle Eastern countries such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia enhanced protections for local nationals. Saudi Arabia required private-sector…
Introduction On Dec. 18, 2024, the finalized Clean Energy Regulations (the Regulation) were published in the Canada Gazette, Part II. Aligning with the release of the final version of the Regulation, the Government of Canada published Powering Canada’s Future: A Clean Electricity Strategy (the Electricity Strategy) on Dec. 17, 2024, which notes that the Regulation is one of the measures that the federal government has taken to help build a…