Breakthrough Innovation Instances

🔬 A new era of biology is coming—not just single-cell, but cell–cell. When flow cytometry first became widely adopted in the 1980s, it revolutionized immunology. Suddenly, we could dissect the immune system one cell at a time, revealing T cell subsets, memory phenotypes, activation states, and more. Entire fields flourished because we could see and sort what was previously invisible. Now imagine doing that—not with one-dimensional fluorescence signals—but with full images of each cell as it's flowing by at thousands per second. And not just of single cells, but of cell pairs, clusters, and interactions. That’s the promise of image-activated cell sorting (IACS). Our recent review in Nature Bioengineering explores how IACS is poised to drive a new biological revolution: 📄 https://lnkd.in/guMkSxqJ At its core, IACS combines high-throughput microscopy, real-time image processing, and precision microfluidic sorting, opening the door to analyze and isolate cells based on morphology, subcellular localization, cell-cell contact, cell secretions and more. 💡 At UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, I’ve had the privilege of watching and contributing to many of these advances emerge—from our collaborations with Keisuke Goda, Bahram Jalali and Kevin Tsia on STEAM to the early FIRE imaging system (Eric Diebold, Ph.D.) that now powers BD’s FACSDiscover CellView, to participating in the "Serendipiter" developed by Keisuke Goda's ImPACT program, to Deepcell (founded by my former PhD student Maddison Masaeli), and now through our work on nanovials (Joe de Rutte, Partillion Bioscience), which serve as test tubes for probing cell-cell communication. We are no longer limited to what a cell expresses in isolation, but can now ask how it behaves, who it talks to, and how it responds. Just as early flow cytometry revealed the immune system's complexity, these tools will help uncover the dynamic networks that govern multicellular biology, development, and disease. Providing the massive data needed to fuel predictive AI models that link cells to tissues to organisms—and perturbations that transform health to disease. 🔁 The future is moving beyond single-cell to interaction-level biology. And the tools are finally here. #CellBiology #SingleCell #ImageActivatedCellSorting #Nanovials #microfluidics #FlowCytometry #IACS #UCLA #Bioengineering #NatureBioengineering

For more than a decade, I have worked on regulatory reform. From my time with 10 Downing Street in the UK, to designing the Red Tape Challenge with the Texas House of Representatives Government Efficiency and Reform Committee, to my current work with cities and states across the U.S. through InnovateUS What I have learned is that efficiency alone is not reform. In my new essay for #RebootDemocracy, I argue that governments need to stop treating AI-driven simplification as an end in itself and start pairing artificial intelligence with collective intelligence. Across the U.S., states and cities are already using AI to tackle regulatory clutter: 💠 Governor of Virginia's Office of Regulatory Management has pursued a mandated 25% reduction in regulatory requirements through its Regulatory Reduction Guide under Executive Order 19. 💠State of Ohio, through The Common Sense Initiative, has reviewed more than 14,600 regulations, identifying over half as obstacles to businesses and amending or rescinding them. 💠City and County of San Francisco, under City Attorney David Chiu, partnered with Stanford RegLab, led by Daniel Ho, to deploy an AI tool that analyzed nearly 16 million words of municipal code and helped eliminate or consolidate hundreds of obsolete reporting requirements. These efforts show what AI does best: scanning massive bodies of law, identifying duplication, contradiction, and procedural “policy sludge” at a scale no human team could manage. But as Jennifer Pahlka has warned, policy clutter isn’t just a technical problem. As I saw firsthand in both the UK and Texas, calls to “simplify” regulation can easily serve as a pretext to weaken protections unless people have a real role in shaping outcomes. That’s why I argue that AI must stop at diagnosis. AI can help us identify high-effort rules. But the people must decide what has public value. In October, Political Watch and mySociety convened the "Designing the Green Tape Challenge" workshop to explore what this pairing looks like in practice, asking how the City of Boston might modernize permitting while protecting health, safety, equity, and the environment, and doing so with the communities most affected. What emerged was fine-tuned process: • AI to map regulatory friction • Public validation grounded in lived experience • Co-design to rewrite rules around purpose, not paperwork Green tape is about clearer, more transparent, and more legitimate rules, which are shaped through shared judgment rather than imposed by automation. I hope this piece is useful to public servants, policymakers, technologists, and civic innovators, especially those, like the Recoding America Fund, working to understand where AI can genuinely help governments deliver better outcomes. 🔗 https://lnkd.in/eFjcUP_w #RebootDemocracy #AIGovernance #CollectiveIntelligence #RegulatoryReform #PublicSectorInnovation

#Finreg I am pleased to share my latest CEPS (Centre for European Policy Studies) Policy Brief, “𝗧𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗧𝘄𝗶𝗻 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗱𝗼𝘅 𝗼𝗳 𝗘𝗨 𝗙𝗶𝗻𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗥𝗲𝗴𝘂𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻”. Over the past two decades, the EU 🇪🇺 has built one of the most sophisticated financial regulatory frameworks worldwide. Yet this evolution has also revealed a structural paradox at the heart of the system: 🔹 𝗥𝗲𝗴𝘂𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝗶𝗻𝗳𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 driven by extensive delegation to Level 2 and Level 3 — resulting in a dense web of technical standards, guidelines and Q&As that complicate compliance and blur accountability. 🔹 𝗟𝗲𝗴𝗶𝘀𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗶𝗱𝗶𝘁𝘆 caused by the over-specification of technical detail in Level 1 — locking parameters into primary law and slowing the EU’s ability to adapt to market and technological change. These two tendencies are not contradictory; they reinforce each other and stem from a more fundamental issue: fragmented supervision across 27 national authorities, which pushes legislators to compensate through ever-greater prescriptiveness. In the Policy Brief, I propose a two-stage reform path: •𝗦𝗵𝗼𝗿𝘁 𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗺: reduce regulatory clutter, streamline Level 2 measures, and strengthen supervisory convergence through systematic peer reviews. •𝗠𝗲𝗱𝗶𝘂𝗺 𝘁𝗼 𝗹𝗼𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗺: reform governance by empowering the European Supervisory Authorities within a principles-based legislative framework, supported by clear mandates and strong accountability — in line with the Meroni doctrine. Only by sequencing 𝘴𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘴𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘥𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘨𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘳 can the EU move towards a regulatory system that remains both stable and adaptive. I hope the paper contributes to the ongoing conversation on how to build a more coherent, responsive and future-proof financial regulatory architecture in Europe. Link to the paper: https://lnkd.in/dvzWh3mf

There’s an emerging biotech market which I expect we’ll be hearing more and more about over the next 5 years - and we’ve got Australian startups playing a role. When cells talk to each other, they don’t just signal with proteins and hormones. They also pass tiny packages called exosomes - which could increasingly be the future of therapeutics, diagnostics, and cosmetics. 🧪 Here’s the science: Exosomes are tiny vesicles (30–150 nm) that cells release into their environment. They’re essentially lipid-wrapped bubbles carrying proteins, RNAs, lipids, and metabolites, which mirror the parent cell. You can look at exosomes to get a good understanding of the cell they originated from. 🚀 Here’s why they’re useful and where (I expect) the market is going: Diagnostics: Since exosomes are naturally present in most bodily fluids, so they’re a non-invasive way to get a read on diseases like cancer, cardiovascular disease, and neurodegeneration. Therapeutics: Exosomes naturally deliver “packages” of information from cell to cell; sounds like an ideal vehicle for drug delivery. For example, RNA therapies could be packaged and sent with the body’s own wrapping paper plus delivery mechanisms, making uptake super effective and free from side-effects. Cosmetics: Exosomes are being used for skin rejuvenation by reducing inflammation and boosting collagen/elastin production. They can also be used to stimulate hair growth. However, this is an area where current regulation varies; in what instances should exosomes be regulated as biologics? Plant-derived exosomes are sometimes used to avoid regulatory measures, but their biologic effectiveness is under debate. ⁉️ The biggest challenges currently seem to be around scale and standardisation. Isolating pure, reproducible exosomes is still tricky and those regulatory frameworks are only just becoming established. Still, I wouldn’t be surprised if “exosome” becomes a general-public buzzword in the next 5 years, as noninvasive diagnostics and off-the-shelf regenerative treatments begin to make their way into the mass markets. 👩🔬 Here are the Australian companies working in this space (that I’m aware of - there may be others!) Exopharm Ltd is building the platforms for large-scale manufacturing of exosomes and exosome-based therapeutics. VivaZome Therapeutics is developing exosome therapies for life-threatening disorders for which current treatments are ineffective Exosome Biosciences has pioneered the world's first-in-human clinical trial of an extracellular vesicle therapy for a specific condition. This company is a spin-out to commercialise IP developed at Monash Health, Monash University and the Hudson Institute of Medical Research 🌎 Keen to hear about other companies world-wide working on exosomes for an end-goal you think is particularly cool!

The Crystal Ball Meets Cybersecurity In today’s high-stakes digital world, reacting to cyber threats just isn’t good enough anymore. By the time you detect a breach, the damage may already be done—data stolen, systems compromised, reputations shattered. That’s why predictive cybersecurity is gaining momentum in 2025, shifting organizations from defense to foresight. Imagine giving your cybersecurity team a crystal ball—not mystical, but powered by artificial intelligence and real-time data. This is no longer a futuristic fantasy; it’s a strategic necessity. At the core of predictive cybersecurity is the ability to analyze vast streams of data—from user behavior and network activity to global threat intelligence—and identify danger before it strikes. It’s a proactive model that learns from past incidents, monitors for subtle behavioral anomalies, and connects dots across the cyber threat landscape. This approach helps organizations stay one step ahead of cybercriminals who move faster and more strategically than ever before. What makes this shift even more powerful is the convergence of AI-driven threat modeling, behavioral baselining, threat intelligence fusion, and automated response. Together, they form a real-time feedback loop that not only forecasts attacks but also enables systems to take immediate, decisive action. The result? Faster threat detection, smarter defenses, and a dramatically reduced window of vulnerabilityThe Crystal Ball Meets Cybersecurity In today’s high-stakes digital world, reacting to cyber threats just isn’t good enough anymore. By the time you detect a breach, the damage may already be done—data stolen, systems compromised, reputations shattered. That’s why predictive cybersecurity is gaining momentum in 2025, shifting organizations from defense to foresight. Imagine giving your cybersecurity team a crystal ball—not mystical, but powered by artificial intelligence and real-time data. This is no longer a futuristic fantasy; it’s a strategic necessity. At the core of predictive cybersecurity is the ability to analyze vast streams of data—from user behavior and network activity to global threat intelligence—and identify danger before it strikes. It’s a proactive model that learns from past incidents, monitors for subtle behavioral anomalies, and connects dots across the cyber threat landscape. This approach helps organizations stay one step ahead of cybercriminals who move faster and more strategically than ever before. What makes this shift even more powerful is the convergence of AI-driven threat modeling, behavioral baselining, threat intelligence fusion, and automated response. Together, they form a real-time feedback loop that not only forecasts attacks but also enables systems to take immediate, decisive action. The result? Faster threat detection, smarter defenses, and a dramatically reduced window of vulnerability. #CyberSecurity #AI #ML #ThreatIntelligence #BehavioralAnalytics

China just bent the rules of electronics — literally. Facinating? Chinese and global researchers are advancing Metal-Polymer Conductors (MPCs) — circuits made from liquid metals like gallium–indium embedded in elastic polymers — that defy traditional rigid wiring by remaining conductive even when stretched up to 500% or more. Why this is a big deal: 🔹 High Stretchability: Certain liquid-metal conductors maintain electrical conductivity even when stretched 5× their original length. 🔹 Durability: Printable metal-polymer conductors can withstand over 10,000 cycles of stretching with minimal resistance change (<3%). 🔹 Conductivity: Hybrid conductors based on indium alloys can achieve extremely high conductivity (~2.98 × 10⁶ S/m) with minimal resistance change under extreme strain. 🔹 Fine Feature Sizes: Advanced techniques can pattern circuits as small as 5 micrometers, rivaling conventional PCBs. Market Insight: The global market for wearable and flexible devices is expected to surge into the hundreds of billions of dollars, with advanced stretchable materials at the core of the next wave of innovation. (Wearable tech projected >US$150B by 2026 in soft electronics growth — wearable industry data) Where AI Fits In: AI is not just hype — it’s accelerating how we design and discover materials like MPCs. AI/ML models help predict material properties — like conductivity and mechanical resilience — before physical prototypes are made. Computational simulations can evaluate thousands of polymer + metal combinations far faster than physical testing alone. AI-assisted optimization reduces lab iterations, cutting time and cost in early-stage development. In other words: AI + materials science = faster discovery of smarter, stretchable electronics. Potential Applications: Soft robotics that mimic human motion Wearables that feel like fabric Artificial skin with embedded sensing Health monitoring devices that conform to the body On-skin motion recognition and bioelectronics. The era of electronics you can twist, stretch, and wear is here — and AI is helping make it a reality. #FlexibleElectronics #MaterialsScience #AIinInnovation #SoftRobotics #WearableTech #DeepTech #FutureOfElectronics #Innovation

🌎 𝗟𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻 𝗔𝗺𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗮 𝗶𝘀 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗻𝗲𝘅𝘁 𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗶𝗻𝗻𝗼𝘃𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 One of the promising innovations in development finance today is the use of 𝗦𝘆𝗻𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝗥𝗶𝘀𝗸 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗳𝗲𝗿𝘀 (𝗦𝗥𝗧𝘀) — instruments that help 𝗳𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝘂𝗽 𝗰𝗮𝗽𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹, 𝗱𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝗳𝘆 𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗸, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝘃𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗶𝗻𝘃𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗲. In Latin America, this market is gradually taking shape. Countries like Mexico, Brazil, and Chile are creating the right conditions to scale these structures, paving the way for a more dynamic and resilient financial ecosystem. At the #IDB Group, we are developing innovative financial solutions to mobilize more capital for development — 𝗶𝗻𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗨𝗦$𝟱𝟬 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝗻𝗲𝘄 𝗹𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗰𝗮𝗽𝗮𝗰𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗻𝗲𝘅𝘁 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗮𝗱𝗲. SRTs could be one of the key strategies driving this expansion, enabling us to optimize balance sheets and crowd in private investment for sustainable growth. If you want to learn more about how SRTs are advancing across Latin America, read the full interview in Structured Credit Investor 👇 🔗 https://lnkd.in/estVptvh

2025 has been a pivotal year in the emergence of tokenization in financial markets. A supportive regulatory framework in the U.S. has provided the confidence to major traditional financial market incumbents to engage with stablecoins and public blockchains. As more traditional financial instruments are created on-chain, this creates opportunities to use these assets in decentralized finance applications. This market evolution and innovation is evident in the several new types of digital asset-related instruments that we have rated during the course of 2025—including tokenized money market funds, a decentralized lending protocol, and a digital asset treasury company—alongside our newly-announced partnership with Chainlink to deliver our stablecoin stability assessments on-chain. Available since December 2023, our stablecoin risk analysis will now be accessible within decentralized finance protocols and smart contracts. S&P Global Ratings believes such uptick in our assessments of new types of instruments reflects an overall industry trend toward convergence between traditional and decentralized finance. While DeFi to date has been mainly focused on cryptocurrency markets, emerging regulatory frameworks are supporting integration with more traditional financial instruments—building a bridge where traditional and decentralized financial frameworks can ultimately combine as the finance of the future. Having overcome significant technical and regulatory hurdles, the digital asset industry's main challenge now is to bring its applications to commercial scale. Read more from our #DeFi subject matter specialists Andrew O'Neill, CFA and Lisa Schroeer in this latest edition of #CreditWeek. 🔗

How can a diverse range of financial instruments finance climate adaptation and resilience? I recommend a timely and instructive new study elaborated by my colleagues at the World Resources Institute, showing how innovative instruments are deployed to mobilize capital for climate adaptation, including blended finance, bonds, concessional and market-based loans, debt swaps, disaster risk financing, equity, grants, guarantees, insurance/risk transfer, and payment for ecosystem services. Investors and policy makers face many choices among financial instruments to adapt to various types of climate risks, including droughts, storms, floods, heatwaves, ecosystem degradation, and wildfires.   In summary, this study sheds light on how 11 different types of financial instruments have mobilized capital for climate adaptation. It does so by analyzing the scope and characteristics of instruments used in 162 cases over the past decade. The study is primarily concerned with whether, and how, each financial instrument enables risk reduction or management—the two components of #climate adaptation. This study also explores the level and sources of the mobilized capital, as well as the roles of different actors.   Our gratitude to the lead authors, including Carter Brandon, Aarushi Aggarwal, Bradley Kratzer, Rebecca Carter, PhD, Valerie Laxton, and Katie Ross for this great contribution. An improved understanding of the different types of financial instruments can indeed help mobilize and unlock more finance! This is much needed as adaptation finance continues to fall short. 🙏🏽🌍🌳   See full paper below, or download at https://lnkd.in/dS7AXmP8

How do we safeguard Europe’s investment capacity – at a time of geopolitical tensions and immense transformation needs? Europe wants to invest: in transformation, in infrastructure, in security, in competitiveness. A key lever for this is a strong and diverse banking system. Regionally anchored, low-risk institutions finance #SMEs, municipalities and households every single day. This structure is not a relic – it is a European competitive advantage. To preserve it, we now need regulatory reform: simpler, more coherent, more proportional. Not less stability. But rules that enable diversity instead of unintentionally levelling it. Concretely, this means: 💡Consolidating capital buffers and removing gold-plating elements such as the Systemic Risk Buffer. 💡Establishing a genuine #EU regime for regional banks – with substantial relief in SREP, reporting, disclosure and governance requirements. 💡Making the CRR3 transitional arrangements permanent and avoiding competitive disadvantages compared to other jurisdictions. 💡Introducing a moratorium on new reporting requirements and consistently reducing redundant reporting obligations. 💡Ensuring coherence in sustainable finance rules – simplifications must be systematically reflected in CRR/CRD and SFDR, aligned with actual data availability. 💡Aligning the ECB’s €30 billion threshold with systemic relevance rather than a static balance sheet size. 💡And particularly important: advancing a dedicated Financial Services Omnibus. The proposal by Lars Klingbeil and Roland Lescure is the right approach. Such a simplification package could enable tangible regulatory improvements in the short term – even before lengthy legislative procedures are concluded. Europe needs speed. A comprehensive review of the financial regulatory framework with a clear focus on competitiveness would send a strong signal. Diversity in the European banking system is not a problem to be solved. It is a competitive advantage we should preserve.