Proximity to New York City has been both a help and a hindrance for the creation of a biotechnology industry on Long Island. The city can be a source of investors and talent, but Long...
The biotech industry in the New York region emerged in the 1980s and 1990s surrounded by a lot of hype and unrealistic expectations. Even those with a more reasoned perspective remember making assumptions about the...
Those interested in furthering Long Island’s biotech industry have faced many challenges over the years. Diane Fabel of the Stony Brook Center for Biotechnology describes some of the bigger ones in the 1990s, both cultural...
How easy is it to attract and retain scientific talent at a biotech company on Long Island? Are there any peculiarities of the region that make this more or less difficult than elsewhere in the...
Being an industrial scientist has both positive and negative sides. Jim Hayward, who later founded Applied DNA Systems, noted both plusses and minuses to his time working at Estée Lauder. He noted that the science...
The benefits of connecting researchers and business people to bring scientific discoveries into the market place are numerous: more effective drugs and better diagnostic procedures, to name only two. But the flip side is that...
What are the criteria for the success or failure of a biotech company? Is it remaining on Long Island? Growth? Successful acquisition by a larger corporation? Bob Franza notes that the ultimate fate of Protein...
Long Island has many prominent educational and research institutions. On paper, it looks like the ideal place to build a biotech industry, especially since it’s near the venture capital powerhouse of New York City. But...
Plants need nitrogen to grow, but a significant portion of the nitrogen in fertilizers is not absorbed by the soil or used by the growing plants. Rather, it washes away into waterways, rivers, and the ocean. This in turn has had devastating effects on marine life. In some areas, excessive nitrogen in the oceans has caused algae blooms that kill wildlife, make it dangerous for people to consume fish or shellfish or in some cases even swim in affected waters. This problem isn’t limited to poorer countries. Nitrogen pollution is a serious problem here on Long Island. In our case, the nitrogen comes primarily from septic tanks and cesspools, although nitrogen from agricultural fertilizers also plays a role. Nitrogen pollution in the waters around Long Island has hampered fishing, made it dangerous to eat seafood from some areas, and caused environmental changes that make coastal areas more prone to flooding.