Creativity and Innovation Day: April 21st

A Canadian-born project, started to celebrate creativity and explore how it can impact and promote innovation, is now an annual event. Today, April 15, Leonardo Da Vinci’s birthday, is when the party begins. Idea Week is seven days that are set aside to encourage creativity and enthusiasm for innovation in the arts, business, science and education sectors. It’s all concluded with Creativity and Innovation Day on April 21.

Da Vinci took different approaches to solving problems and working with ideas. He is, if you will, the mascot and hero of Creativity and Innovation Day.

Why celebrate? Find new solutions to old problems, create new opportunities, breakdown barriers and open new choices.

Want to know what can you do to celebrate the day?

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Toronto Centre for Brain Fitness

Monday, April 7, 2008 was a day of celebration for a group of “brainiaks” from MaRS and our Baycrest colleagues as they announced:
“Ontario government invests $10 million into the New Centre for Brain Fitness at Baycrest.”

The funding will provide much needed fuel for the development and commercialization of solutions aimed at assessment and maintenance of cognitive abilities.

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Celebrating young innovators

Do you know an innovative young leader? Spring is here, and it’s time for students to apply for the Millennium Excellence Awards.

These scholarships reward leaders who are contributing to Canada’s future. It is so important to encourage and celebrate innovation in young leaders. Our future lies in the hands of these up and coming brilliant young minds working hard for the greater good. They’re the next generation of MaRtians, your future employees, or maybe the head of Canada’s next big innovation success story.

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April ‘08 issue of Scientific American

As a journalist, I love wikis just as much as the next person when I’m looking for a starting point for information. But you have to take the information with a (sometimes giant) grain of salt. If anyone can edit the content of the article, who’s to say any of it is true? I usually skip right to the recommended resources and check out the sites that the article’s information is based on. I do appreciate the sites that are listed because they are sometimes full of insight.

As a journalist, I sometimes get upset at the thought that “anyone can be a journalist” ; if I had to go to school for it, why shouldn’t everyone else?

Now they are coming out with scientific wikis and blogs in which anyone can have their say — anyone can be a citizen journalist — but are they bound by any standards?

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MaRS Innovation — a commercialization partnership of 14 Toronto-based academic research institutions — is among 11 new Centres of Excellence for Commercialization and Research (CECRs) announced last week in Ottawa.

As a CECR, MaRS Innovation will receive $14.95 million for a five-year program to accelerate the commercialization of promising research from its member institutions. The Founding Board Chair of MaRS Innovation is Mary Jo Haddad, President and CEO of The Hospital for Sick Children.

More information:

• CECR news release: “Government of Canada announces 11 new Centres of Excellence for Commercialization and Research”
• MaRS news relase: “Ottawa Funds MaRS Innovation”

Winds of change for (bio)fuel financing

The winds of change are blowing. Regulators are starting to admit to overblown statements on the benefits of certain biofuels, with many European governments revising their subsidization programs. Vague government programs, created with the best intentions, have had some unintended consequences. It’s high time to pause and reflect on how effective these programs are.

The New York Times had a great “State of the Regulatory Industry” a few weeks ago that delves into the changing regulatory landscape and ever-controversial farm subsidies. Expect more stringency and less blanket funding for biofuel projects.

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A sea of innovation for greening the earth

January 14th, 2008, marked a momentous occasion in the corporate world and for the betterment of the environment. In the first-of-its-kind collaboration, leading corporations came together on a united front for a common social goal.

The effort, called the “Eco-Patent Commons,” is a collection of technology patents, pledged to a publicly-available portfolio by companies and other IP rights holders. The purpose of making public dozens of eco-friendly patents is to create a resource for cleaner solutions for those facing similar challenges.

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Earth’s lights will be dimmed

The countdown to Earth Hour is well underway. A partnership between The Star and WWF-Canada intends to show the public’s concern for global warming to our political leaders. The ask is to shut off the lights and stop the appliances for one hour in the month of March. The result so far is a great collection of resources and information on climate change and the public policy around this issue.

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Toronto: Science City

What’s the best-kept secret in the research district?

That Toronto is becoming the 21st century Medici Court of biomedical research, with an incredible talent pool, according to neurosurgeon and spinal cord injury researcher Dr. Michael Fehlings in last weekend’s Globe and Mail.

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Has health care innovation been abandoned?

Much like an abandoned car, it appears that the two health care systems I am most familiar with (USA and Canada) have been left to rust. It may seem like a naïve question but I don’t have a clear idea of who is in charge of delivering healthcare innovations to patients.

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