A unique study of 16 pairs of identical twins in which one twin is obese and the other lean has yielded some surprising results.

In 8 of the pairs of twins, the obese twin was as ‘metabolically healthy’ as his or her lean co-twin, while in the other 8 pairs, the obese twin had a poorer blood fat profile, higher liver fat and increased insulin production and resistance, and higher blood pressure — all hallmarks of unhealthy obesity that can lead to diabetes, heart problems and other complications. The study is by Dr Kirsi Pietiläinen, Dr Jussi Naukkarinen and colleagues from the Obesity Research Unit, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland, and is published in Diabetologia, the journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD).

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Seiko Epson is creating a new form of wearable computer technology – similar to that under development by Google Glass – but which will be ‘far superior’ to the US-based multinational company’s product, the Japanese corporation’s president told EurActiv in an interview.

Minoru Usui – in Brussels last week to launch new technology relating to the company’s traditional precision printing business – said the new ideas would feed into its Moverio smart glass technology and radically improve it.

Every startup fears that one angry and unfair customer who can jeopardize the business by a negative post on Ripoff Report, Yelp, or one of the hundreds of other consumer complaint and review sites on the Internet. Most entrepreneurs don’t even know how to keep track of what people are saying about them on the web, much less how to respond or remove it.

Web reputation management, both business and personal, has become a top priority requirement. On the personal side, these items can kill your career, as I discussed in an old article “Google Yourself to See How Other People See You.”

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NASA, USAID, Nike and the U.S. State Department don't sound like teammates, but they're all equal participants in an international accelerator focusing on sustainable programs and social good.

In 2010, the quartet partnered on LAUNCH, a sort of Y Combinator for global development that has raised more than $40 million and helped bring clean water to 4.5 million Kenyans, as well as affordable, renewable energy to 3,000 people in India.

Image: Mashable

Pantyhose made Steve Jurvetson decide to pivot.

Mr. Jurvetson, a managing director at venture firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson, said he decided to stop investing in what he considered “frivolous” deals after getting pitched on three e-commerce pantyhose deals in less than five months back when he was focusing on mostly Internet companies during the first dot-com boom.

“Those types of deals are like crabs in the economy. They play a role, but who cares,” said Mr. Jurvetson, who said the plethora of pantyhose pitches caused him to educate himself to specialize in fiberoptics and nanotechnology. “It’s been a progression. Learning about one thing has led to another.”

GE’s Ecomagination project has been in place since 2005.  The initiative has the noble goal of not only developing innovative solutions to energy and environmental issues but following through and driving the actual production of this technology.  Often great ideas are disconnected from real world application but the Ecomagination projects generated $25 billion in revenue in 2012 on a R&D investment of only $2 billion.  Astounding figures and validation that investing in world-changing innovative technology is an incredibly efficient way to make money.

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The federal government shutdown has impacted funding for a range of Research and Development (R&D) sectors. And, a senior analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) in Washington DC says the interruption will compromises the innovative capacity of the US economy.

The shutdown is in its early stages, but according to the ITIF’s Stephen Ezell, even if the interruption only lasts for a short time, the damage has already been done.

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The future of robots is modular, self-assembling, and kind of scary.

Researchers at MIT are working on M-Blocks, tiny, cube-shaped robots that seem only steps away from recreating scenes from Terminator 2 or Transformers. 

The robots, which have no external moving parts, can propel themselves in any direction and can form themselves into stacks to create structures.

An innovation report written for Chile offers many recommendations that apply to the U.S. and most other advanced and emerging economies. Most notable, writes Guest Columnist Irving Wladawsky-Berger, is how the report expands readers’ understanding of innovation by placing it in a historical timeframe. "Innovation is essentially how individuals, communities and institutions deal with periods of accelerating changes and historical transitions," Mr. Wladawksy-Berger he writes. Companies and economies need to understand the major long term changes and “develop a vision of the future.”

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If you are a merchant that accepts credit or debit, you have a lot of information to keep in your head about accepting payments, staying current on the latest technologies and program rules — not to mention watching out for fraud and loss issues.

That’s where the website from Community Merchants USA (CMUSA) comes in. We’ve been bringing you a series on accepting electronic payments and what you need to know, sponsored by CMUSA, so we thought we’d tell you a little about the CMUSA resource.

URBANA — Among the challenges facing the U.S. "innovation ecosystem" are the ability to continually attract talented students and researchers and the lack of multiyear budget planning for federal funding agencies, like the National Science Foundation, said a former director of the agency Wednesday.

Science and engineering research is an "inherently long-term" investment, necessitating the need for not just an annual budget planning process, but planning five years out, said Subra Suresh, who was director of the National Science Foundation from 2010 to 2013.

Image: Heather Coit/The News-Gazette

Sprint showed off the home of its new Kansas City business accelerator Wednesday in the Crossroads Arts District.

The Sprint Mobile Health Accelerator will provide workspace, mentors and financing to 10 business startups next year. Its focus is on connecting mobile devices and health care, working with local entrepreneurs and attracting new ones.

Mayor Sly James said the theme taps into and builds on Kansas City’s already globally noted health care institutions such as the Stowers Institute for Medical Research.

Image: Jill Toyoshiba | The Kansas City Star

Viral marketing and word-of-mouth are not enough these days to make your product and brand visible in the relentless onslaught of new promotional media out there today. Innovation in marketing is perhaps more important than product innovation. Yet in the business plans I see, the marketing content and budget are smaller than ever.

More than just spending, you need to create an “experience” in this digital age which sets you apart from the banner ads, email blasts, and old-school websites out there today. According to a book a while back by Rick Mathieson, these have morphed into a digital universe of augmented reality, advergames, and virtual worlds – that are highly personalizable and uniquely shareable.

The Federal Aviation Administration is considering relaxing restrictions on the use of electronic devices on airplanes. Since there is a lot of confusion among passengers about why restrictions apply, clarification is a sensible move. As it is, many passengers accidentally or deliberately violate the rules they don’t like or understand. According to one private survey, as many as 30 percent of passengers left their devices on when they were not supposed to.

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After the dental world took a leaf out of Vine's book this week by introducing Blizzident, a 3D-printed toothbrush that can clean your teeth in six seconds, Mashable's online community responded with a wide range of reactions.

What's more, when Miley Cyrus gave an explanation for why her tongue is always out, many readers said she could benefit from using Blizzident's built-in tongue brusher.

Deciding to be an entrepreneur is a lifestyle move, and should be part of a long-term strategic plan. You shouldn’t be making this decision just because you are mad at your boss, you would like to be rich, or someone else thinks it’s a good idea. In these changing times, if you already have a startup, with no plan, maybe it’s time to think ahead for a change.

Formally, that’s called developing and maintaining a strategic plan. Usually that means writing something down, since it’s hard to maintain something, or track yourself against it, if it’s not written down.

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The need for entrepreneurial thinkers and innovators is at an all time high. Fueled by the 2008 Financial Crisis and the arrival of economic powers China, India and Brazil, universities have proactively incorporated entrepreneurship into the curriculum at a feverish pace. In fact, according to the Kauffman Foundation, there are now more than 5,000 entrepreneurship-related courses being offered in two-year and four-year institutions. By comparison, in 1985 there were 250.

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Entrepreneurship Ecosystems.  Or business ecosystem.  Or economic development ecosystem.  There is a great deal of talk about this approach from around the world.  One of the better discussions I’ve heard was held last month at the Liverpool

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Some say the feel-good days of venture capital are over. They point out that VC has faced significant headwinds in the past few years, and that it often has taken on a less glamorous role than it did in the heady times when venture capital was considered synonymous with start-ups.

It’s true that the number of funds has been shrinking, even as corporate VC has surpassed the levels of the dot-com era. And it’s also true that you’re more likely to find VC money invested in companies that are at later, revenue-generating levels, while family, friends and angel investors are more likely to fund early-stage companies.

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Too much dumb money rushing into the angel investment game is inevitable with crowdsourcing, AngelList and other innovations. Innovation is welcome. Liquidity for startups is welcome. How much is too much?

Please share your thoughts.

I will kick this off with some of mine:

Here’s one article from Harvard Business Review on the subject: Can Crowdfunding Solve the Startup Capital Gap?

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