When the oceanographer Charles Moore first discovered the Great Pacific Garbage Patch–an area of the ocean where currents concentrate the plastic we throw into the ocean–in 1997, he was shocked by its magnitude and persistence. “It seemed unbelievable, but I never found a clear spot,” he wrote later in Natural History magazine. “In the week it took to cross the subtropical high, no matter what time of day I looked, plastic debris was floating everywhere: bottles, bottle caps, wrappers, fragments.” In the years since the plastic buildup has only worsened. In a recent article in the New York Times, Moore reported that the Patch, through a process of accretion, now contains “solid areas you could walk on.”

Image: Boyan Slat, who first set out a vision of his Ocean Cleanup machine in a TED talk six years ago when he was just 17. (Image: courtesy The Ocean Cleanup Foundation)

Billionaire Starbucks chairman Howard Schultz talked to Arizona State University graduates on Monday about his dissatisfaction with the state of politics and how younger generations could prepare to incite change.

After sharing his own story of overcoming adversity to build one of the most successful companies in America, Schultz said "my generation has not made it easy for you" to achieve the same.

I’m willing to bet you didn’t know that artificial intelligence can help sort cucumbers.

It can, and in fact it does. And while AI has gotten massive amounts of attention recently due to its role in making cars autonomous, doing facial recognition, and automatically translating languages, there’s one man in Silicon Valley who really wants everyone developing any kind of technology-based tool to know that AI has something to offer them as well.

JumpStart has partnered with the Cleveland Foundation to establish a new organizational philanthropic fund, the foundation announced at its annual meeting this week.

During his Robert D. Gries Keynote Lecture, AOL co-founder Steve Case said he was "delighted" to hear that creating an inclusive approach to entrepreneurship and innovation is a focus for both the Cleveland Foundation and JumpStart.

Image: Photo by CONTRIBUTED PHOTO - Dan Moulthrop, CEO of the City Club of Cleveland, moderates the Robert D. Gries Keynote Lecture, delivered by AOL co-founder Steve Case.

We all know the San Francisco Bay Area is home to Silicon Valley, but a few cities and states around the country are trying to recreate the region’s success. In Nebraska, you have Silicon Prairie, then there’s Silicon Alley in New York City, Silicon Roundabout in London, and Silicon Beach in Venice, California. Many of these have popped up in just the past few years, and some states are beginning to realize the importance of supporting these new innovation hubs.

The field of technology transfer from higher education to business and commercial developments once focused strongly on obtaining patents for products developed by university research. Today, there are many commercialization projects that may benefit more from other types of protection, said Chase Kasper, assistant vice president for research, technology transfer and corporate relations, University of Southern Mississippi (USM).

Looking to locate all things innovative in the North Texas region? Here’s the interactive toolkit that puts it at your fingertips. The maps include accelerators and incubators, innovation centers, makerspaces, executive offices, and coworking spaces. 

The growing startup community led to the creation of the maps by the Dallas Regional Chamber in collaboration with Dallas Innovates. 

Each tab represents different areas of the ecosystem. The maps will be updated as more resources become available and will remain an active source of information for North Texas.

Image: https://www.dallasinnovates.com

I see more and more entrepreneurs who seem to have everything going for them – vision, motivation, passion, even a good business plan, product, and money, and yet they can’t close customers. Maybe it’s time to look harder at the mantra of a new breed of gurus and successful entrepreneurs, including Steve Blank and Eric Ries, called “nail it then scale it” (NISI).

Image: http://blog.startupprofessionals.com

Ask five different entrepreneurs what the most important aspect of their business is, and you’ll likely get five different answers. Exceptional employees? Great products? Killer strategy? These are all reasonable and common responses. One answer that you will rarely hear, though, is that your business is nothing without you. It sounds simple, but it’s 100% true. You are the driving force behind your business. You are the brains behind the entire operation. If you are not looking after yourself and performing at the best of your ability, how can you expect your business to thrive?

The incubator will join others already in operation, with the hope the companies will stay in the county.

Montgomery County is close to picking a partner to help create a new incubator in Silver Spring focused on tech and media, according to the head of Montgomery County's relatively new economic development corporation.

The county has narrowed its list to two potential candidates to turn the Silver Spring Innovation Center, which is underutilized, into an incubator offering work space, programming and a chance to grow businesses in the county, said EDC CEO David Petr. The hope is to pick a finalist in about 30 days.

Image: David Petr, president and CEO of the Montgomery County Economic Development Corporation… -  JOANNE S. LAWTON

Don’t be surprised if Stephen Wolfram, the renowned complexity theorist, software company CEO, and night owl, wants to schedule a work call with you at 9 p.m. In fact, after a decade of logging every phone call he makes, Wolfram knows the exact probability he’ll be on the phone with someone at that time: 39 percent.

Image: Stephen Wolfram created the search engine Wolfram Alpha. - https://www.technologyreview.com

What's the definition of "doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result?" If you said "a good idea," you might want to consider a career in politics.

Many in Congress want to impose price controls on medicines that result from federally funded research. We've tried this before, and it nearly brought medical research and development to a halt. 

How should teams of experts working on knowledge-intensive projects be structured? Should they be hierarchical? Or will flexible, self-organized groups perform better? 

Teams often struggle with how to get the most value from the members’ expertise, to minimize conflict, to integrate their diverse expertise, and to leverage it during all phases of a project.

“If you build it, they will come.” It's a line from an old movie "Field of Dreams" which is still leading to the demise of too many startups, led by entrepreneurs who really started their business to build an exciting new product or service. Most struggle with the idea and practice of marketing and sales, and see these as a necessary evil, if even required.

Of course, for a price, there are many marketing organizations and gurus willing to come to your aid. But marketing is not “rocket science,” so I’m a big proponent of self-help and practicing the pragmatics in-house first

Would you agree or disagree with each of the following statements?

• I wish I had fewer problems in life. 
• I wish I didn’t have to struggle so much in life.
• I wish I had the opportunities that other people have. 

If you agreed to any one of the above statements, then you are not thinking like an incredibly successful person. Success leaves clues. What clues can we glean from incredibly successful people? Let’s break down each of the above statements.

A common misconception is that innovation can’t be taught. Similar to how some people believe that artists are born, not made – innovation has often seemed to be the purview of the great thinkers, the elite, people whose creativity is given, not a matter of practice… The good news is that in a recent study by the authors of the Innovator’s DNA, researchers put sets of identical and fraternal twins through creative thinking tests and discovered that only 25 percent to 40 percent of creative performance could be attributed to genetics alone, which means that the majority of creative thought can be cultivated.

Ohio Innovation Fund LLC, the venture capital fund created by Ohio State University and Ohio University, has added at least $5 million to an investment pool that now totals $40 million, according to a regulatory filing. It's from as-yet-unidentified new limited partners.

Image: Bill Baumel, Ohio Innovation Fund - http://www.bizjournals.com

“You are paddleboarding next to approximately 15 great white sharks,” Deputy Brian Stockbridge announced via a loudspeaker.

Stockbridge was in a helicopter, flying off the coast of Dana Point in Orange County, Calif., at about 2 p.m. local time on Wednesday. And, indeed, swimming in the Pacific Ocean below and clearly visible from the air, were several great white sharks. Their fins rose menacingly from the water as they glided back and forth.

Image: https://www.washingtonpost.com/

Americans seem to be curbing their love affair with the suburbs as millennials move to major metropolitan areas for the excitement and amenities of city living. But this shift is creating challenges of its own — increasingly unaffordable housing, rising inequality and strains on aging infrastructure, among other consequences. Author Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto, calls it The New Urban Crisis, which is also the title of his book. He discussed his findings on the Knowledge@Wharton show, which airs on SiriusXM channel 111.

Image: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu

Advances in cognitive neuroscience are enabling insights into the brain like never before. Neuroscientist Friederike Fabritius and Hans Hagemann, co-founder of the Munich Leadership Group, combine science with management consulting to discover which techniques for peak performance actually work, in their book The Leading Brain: Powerful Science-Based Strategies for Achieving Peak Performance. Hagemann recently joined the Knowledge@Wharton show, which airs on SiriusXM channel 111, to discuss science-based strategies for peak performance.

Image: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu