The White House plans to prioritize emerging technology and big data in the fiscal year 2017 budget, according to a memorandum published last week. 

When submitting budget requests to the Office of Management and Budget, federal agencies should "prioritize investments in enabling technologies that benefit multiple sectors of the economy, such as nanotechnology, robotics, the Materials Genome Initiative, and cyber-physical systems and their application to smart cities,” the memo said.

The healthcare industry can take lessons in innovation from sources as diverse as Chipotle, the zoo or the Apple store, leaders at the Sibley Innovation Hub told the Washington Business Journal.

Leaders at the District of Columbia's Sibley Memorial Hospital launched the Hub last year to foster innovative ideas from employees on improving care, Nick Dawson, the Hub's executive director, told the publication.

It’s become fashionable for entrepreneurs to both make money and tout how they’re helping the community, the environment, or those in need. Millennial consumers, in particular, are demanding that their purchases have a “give back” component. And so at a time when the en vogue social entrepreneurs are hungry for eye-popping numbers of things donated or lives touched, Jacob Lief is promoting a fairly contrarian perspective. He says that when it comes to changing lives, less is more.

Image: Tim Hans 

What are Oliver Emberton's tips for running a blog?

Answer below by Quora user Oliver Emberton, Founder of Silktide.

In my first year of blogging I was read over 4 million times, mostly through a cunning strategy I call "screwing everything up and learning."

Let me save you some time. Here are the five most surprising lessons I learned:

1. The world owes you nothing

A website is a startup's opportunity to distinguish itself from its competitors while also promoting its value and offerings to current and potential customers. An enticing home page with attention-grabbing visuals and a user-friendly interface is sure to boost engagement, but when you're in a rush to launch, crucial components can be easily overlooked. Unfortunately, the cost of ignoring the basics is high when it comes to converting customers.

The City of Austin has launched a program to let businesses in distinct sections of the city work together to shape the direction of their neighborhoods. The Austin Monitor reports that the Soul-y Austin Business District Incubator is a pilot project from the city’s economic development department designed to help businesses form merchant associations in four neighborhoods.

Image: NICK SIMONITE 

Ten startup companies from around the world are hoping to revolutionize the robotics industry—with the help of the first Qualcomm Robotics Accelerator, a 16-week mentorship program powered by Techstars who specializes in running mentorship-driven accelerator programs.

ROCKVILLE, Md., May 20, 2015  -- Today, Relevant Health, a newly launched innovative health technology startup accelerator focused on bringing products to market, announced that it is now accepting applications from health tech startups for its Fall 2015 class. Additionally, the accelerator launched its website and the portal to its streamlined application process. U.S. and international startups are encouraged to apply.

Relevant Health's five-month program involves an intensive product-focused curriculum that gives founders of health tech startups the skills to define, develop, position and launch a viable health tech product. The new accelerator will be based out of a brand-new cowork space in the Rockville Innovation Center, centrally located in the heart of the Montgomery County (Maryland) life sciences corridor. Companies admitted to the accelerator will have access to the cowork facility along with other support that includes up to $50,000 in funding, mentorship, development support from a pool of software engineers, and access to the local health tech ecosystem.

Over the past decade, marketers have increasingly turned to social-media networks like Facebook and Twitter to create buzz around their products. But what impact do tweets and other recommendations have on sales, and how can companies get a bigger return on their investments in these important channels?

To get a clearer view, we examined the purchase decisions of 20,000 European consumers, across 30 product areas and more than 100 brands, in 2013 and 2014. Respondents were asked how significantly social media influenced their decision journeys and about instances when they themselves recommended products.1

Over her 34-year nursing career Martha Kuhl, a pediatric oncology nurse at U.C.S.F. Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland in California, has seen her patient load more than double. She recalls one night shift when she was the lone nurse on duty with five patients. “These are all babies that can’t breathe,” she says. “I felt okay at four” but that last patient “sort of tipped it over the edge where I felt unsafe in being able to handle all of these patients.”

Image: National Nurses United/Flickr

A new survey report just published by Staples Advantage offers a paradoxical set of findings about US office workers. Overwhelmingly, they are happy. Yet the majority of them feel burned out.  How could both things be true?

Raising rounds of venture capital is the goal for many companies: An influx of cash is certainly the fastest way to jump-start your growth and start hitting key milestones more quickly. But venture capital isn't a silver bullet, and it's not the right fit for every company.

To better understand the benefits and drawbacks, I polled nine successful entrepreneurs from YEC to get their thoughts on some of the biggest pitfalls to be wary of, and advice on how to avoid them entirely.

Biodegradable, wood-based computer chips can perform just as well as chips commonly used for wireless communication, according to new research.

The inventors argue that the new chips could help address the global problem of rapidly accumulating electronic waste, some of which contains potentially toxic materials. The results also show that a transparent, wood-derived material called nanocellulose paper is an attractive alternative to plastic as a surface for flexible electronics.

It was called the court case that could end unpaid internships. Its initial ruling was hailed as a major win for unpaid interns, one that could concretely establish the illegality of many uncompensated internships. But a new appellate court ruling in the case has paid intern advocates worried the pendulum could swing back in the other direction.

With the 24-hour news cycle and at-your-fingers access to the latest stories, the American people have plenty of information constantly available to them. And whether they know it or not, they are using much of that information as a de facto source for evaluating the effectiveness of government.

Proper grammar seems to be a thing of the past -- why stress about tiny technicalities, right? Wrong.

You should be a grammar stickler for many reasons. Do you want to risk turning off potential clients, employers and connections because of grammatical mistakes?

Many people are so concerned with what they are saying in an email or text message that they completely forget to pay attention to how they are saying it. If you chose to turn grammar mode off when you are communicating with friends, that is one thing, but there is absolutely no reason to send a professional communication that contains errors.

We all reach critical points in our lives where our mental toughness is tested. It might be a toxic friend or colleague, a dead-end job, or a struggling relationship.

Whatever the challenge, you have to be strong, see things through a new lens, and take decisive action if you want to move through it successfully.

Habits form our lives. They provide a framework on which we build professional success and personal happiness. As a society, we’re fascinated with the habits of others, usually prominent figures – celebrities, political figures, and, of course, famous entrepreneurs.  (Think: Richard Branson, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, to name just a few.)

Securing funding from traditional lenders has become increasingly difficult for many small-business owners. Banks are under a lot of pressure to make good loans, and that pressure trickles down to entrepreneurs.

Fortunately, in the past year, the amount of small businesses with crowdfunding campaigns has significantly increased, proving it’s a viable alternative funding option. A 2015 report from Massolution, a research firm specializing in the crowdsourcing and crowdfunding industries, shows 41 percent of all crowdfunding capital raised last year was for business and entrepreneurship.