Profile of biomedical engineer and medical device developer Boris Gramatikov

It’s tough to get young children to sit still, much less to get them to look in the same spot for any length of time. This is likely not news to you. And no, you haven’t stumbled upon a parenting advice column. It’s about helping children whose eyesight is at risk.

Amblyopia, otherwise known as lazy eye, is a disorder of the visual system that is characterized by indistinct vision in an eye that is otherwise physically normal. Amblyopia can be caused by poor or no transmission of the visual image to the brain, due to either strabismus (misalignment of the eyes) – when the brain may suppress the input from one eye to avoid double vision or visual confusion, or defocus – a discrepancy in the focus between the two eyes can lead to amblyopia in the defocused eye.

Read More

I am so jazzed.  I attended “Immigrant Entrepreneurs:  Creating Jobs and Strengthening the Economy” hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Immigration Council’s Immigration Policy Center (IPC).  It was such an energizing event because it was focused on the benefits of immigration.  No mention of the “problem of immigration”, well except for fact that US immigration policy is getting in the way of global competitiveness.

Four immigrant entrepreneurs discussed their journey to their success.  From Maryland, Mei Xu of Chesapeake Bay Candles explained that her inspiration grew from window shopping at Bloomingdales where she noted that home fashions did not keep pace with clothing trends.  She decided that she would fill that gap in the marketplace.  Like many entrepreneurs, her initial capital came from family and friends.  Due to her and her husband’s hard work and great timing, her business has grown tremendously with several factories around the world.  Perhaps her proudest (and possibly most difficult) achievement was building a factory in Glen Burnie, Maryland and bringing manufacturing jobs back to the U.S.  Her accomplishment led to her invitation to share her insights with President Obama on Insourcing American Jobs Forum.

Read More

The Administration announced a series of new steps to expand access to capital, cut red tape, and accelerate innovation, building on a year of prior actions through the White House Startup America Initiative. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced several measures they will implement to streamline existing pathways for immigrant entrepreneurs to enter and create businesses in the U.S., retain more foreign-born science and technology graduates from U.S. universities, facilitate immigration by top researchers, and help U.S. startups and other companies compete for global talent.

This sounds wonderful! At the very least, it signals recognition on the part of the government that immigrants contribute to the health of the U.S. economy. In reviewing the language of the DHS proposals, I am a bit underwhelmed.

Read More

I envision a United States where the red carpet and the paparazzi are not just for starlets. Instead, it is the people who toil away in research labs and solve complex medical problems who have a Paparazzi problem. That instead of having breathless conversations around the water cooler about Beyonce’s baby, that the stories we talk about are those involving scientific breakthroughs that are saving children’s lives, or shape the way the medical industry diagnoses and treats heart disease through medical imaging.

The National Science Board, the national policy-making body for the National Science Foundation (NSF), issued a report this past month that found that America’s status as global leader in supporting science and technology research and development is slipping. Rapidly.

Read More