Making technological innovation work for sustainable development.

This paper presents insights and action proposals to better harness technological innovation for sustainable development. We begin with three key insights from scholarship and practice. First, technological innovation processes do not follow a set sequence but rather emerge from complex adaptive systems involving many actors and institutions operating simultaneously from local to global scales. Barriers arise at all stages of innovation, from the invention of a technology through its selection, production, adaptation, adoption, and retirement. Second, learning from past efforts to mobilize innovation for sustainable development can be greatly improved through structured cross-sectoral comparisons that recognize the socio-technical nature of innovation systems. Third, current institutions (rules, norms, and incentives) shaping technological innovation are often not aligned toward the goals of sustainable development because impoverished, marginalized, and unborn populations too often lack the economic and political power to shape innovation systems to meet their needs. However, these institutions can be reformed, and many actors have the power to do so through research, advocacy, training, convening, policymaking, and financing. We conclude with three practice-oriented recommendations to further realize the potential of innovation for sustainable development: (i) channels for regularized learning across domains of practice should be established; (ii) measures that systematically take into account the interests of underserved populations throughout the innovation process should be developed; and (iii) institutions should be reformed to reorient innovation systems toward sustainable development and ensure that all innovation stages and scales are considered at the outset

Innovation and access to technologies for sustainable development: diagnosing weaknesses and identifying interventions in the Transnational Arena

Sustainable development – improving human well-being across present generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs – is a central challenge for the 21st century. Technological innovation can play an important role in moving society toward sustainable development. However, poor, marginalized, and future populations often do not fully benefit from innovation due to their lack of market or political power to influence innovation processes. As a result, current innovation systems fail to contribute as much as they might to meeting sustainable development goals. This paper focuses on how actors and institutions operating in the transnational arena can mitigate such shortfalls. To identify the most important transnational functions required to meet sustainable development needs our analysis undertook three main steps. First, we developed a framework to diagnose blockages in the global innovation system for particular technologies. This framework was built on existing theory and new empirical analysis. On the theory side, we drew from the literatures of systems dynamics; technology and sectoral innovation systems, science and technology studies, the economics of innovation, and global governance. On the empirical front, we conducted eighteen detailed case studies of technology innovation in multiple sectors relevant to sustainable development: water, energy, health, food, and manufactured goods. We use the framework to analyze our case studies in the common language of (1) technology stocks, (2) non-linear flows between stocks substantiated by specific mechanisms, and (3) characteristics of actors and socio-technical conditions (STCs) which mediate the flows between stocks . We identify blockages in the innovation system for each of the cases, diagnosing where in the innovation system flows were hindered and which specific sets of STCs and actor characteristics were associated with these blockages. Figure E.1 displays the components of our framework and how they relate

Innovation and Access to Technologies for Sustainable Development: A Global Systems Perspective

This workshop report is a summary of themes discussed by five panels during a daylong workshop on “Innovation and Access to Technologies for Sustainable Development: A Global Perspective” at Harvard University on April 24,2014. The workshop brought together a diverse group of scholars to explore how the technological innovation needed for sustainable development can be promoted in ways that assure equitable access in current and future generations. Three key themes that emerged from the workshop include:(1) The central role of power, politics and agency in analyzing technological innovation and sustainable development -an important aspect of this includes the articulation of the roles of actors and organizations within frameworks and models of innovation systems.(2) The importance of focusing both on supply-push and demand-pull mechanisms in innovation scholarship and innovation policy.(3) The need to focus on more innovation scholarship around the goals of sustainable development

An ex vivo cystic fibrosis model recapitulates key clinical aspects of chronic Staphylococcus aureus infection

Staphylococcus aureus is the most prevalent organism isolated from the airways of people with cystic fibrosis (CF), predominantly early in life. Yet its role in the pathology of lung disease is poorly understood. In mice, and many experiments using cell lines, the bacterium invades cells or interstitium, and forms abscesses. This is at odds with the limited available clinical data: interstitial bacteria are rare in CF biopsies and abscesses are highly unusual. Bacteria instead appear to localize in mucus plugs in the lumens of bronchioles. We show that, in an established ex vivo model of CF infection comprising porcine bronchiolar tissue and synthetic mucus, S. aureus demonstrates clinically significant characteristics including colonization of the airway lumen, with preferential localization as multicellular aggregates in mucus, initiation of a small colony variant phenotype and increased antibiotic tolerance of tissue-associated aggregates. Tissue invasion and abscesses were not observed. Our results may inform ongoing debates relating to clinical responses to S. aureus in people with CF

Disorders of sex development : insights from targeted gene sequencing of a large international patient cohort

Background: Disorders of sex development (DSD) are congenital conditions in which chromosomal, gonadal, or phenotypic sex is atypical. Clinical management of DSD is often difficult and currently only 13% of patients receive an accurate clinical genetic diagnosis. To address this we have developed a massively parallel sequencing targeted DSD gene panel which allows us to sequence all 64 known diagnostic DSD genes and candidate genes simultaneously. Results: We analyzed DNA from the largest reported international cohort of patients with DSD (278 patients with 46, XY DSD and 48 with 46, XX DSD). Our targeted gene panel compares favorably with other sequencing platforms. We found a total of 28 diagnostic genes that are implicated in DSD, highlighting the genetic spectrum of this disorder. Sequencing revealed 93 previously unreported DSD gene variants. Overall, we identified a likely genetic diagnosis in 43% of patients with 46, XY DSD. In patients with 46, XY disorders of androgen synthesis and action the genetic diagnosis rate reached 60%. Surprisingly, little difference in diagnostic rate was observed between singletons and trios. In many cases our findings are informative as to the likely cause of the DSD, which will facilitate clinical management. Conclusions: Our massively parallel sequencing targeted DSD gene panel represents an economical means of improving the genetic diagnostic capability for patients affected by DSD. Implementation of this panel in a large cohort of patients has expanded our understanding of the underlying genetic etiology of DSD. The inclusion of research candidate genes also provides an invaluable resource for future identification of novel genes

The North American tree-ring fire-scar network

Fire regimes in North American forests are diverse and modern fire records are often too short to capture important patterns, trends, feedbacks, and drivers of variability. Tree-ring fire scars provide valuable perspectives on fire regimes, including centuries-long records of fire year, season, frequency, severity, and size. Here, we introduce the newly compiled North American tree-ring fire-scar network (NAFSN), which contains 2562 sites, >37,000 fire-scarred trees, and covers large parts of North America. We investigate the NAFSN in terms of geography, sample depth, vegetation, topography, climate, and human land use. Fire scars are found in most ecoregions, from boreal forests in northern Alaska and Canada to subtropical forests in southern Florida and Mexico. The network includes 91 tree species, but is dominated by gymnosperms in the genus Pinus. Fire scars are found from sea level to >4000-m elevation and across a range of topographic settings that vary by ecoregion. Multiple regions are densely sampled (e.g., >1000 fire-scarred trees), enabling new spatial analyses such as reconstructions of area burned. To demonstrate the potential of the network, we compared the climate space of the NAFSN to those of modern fires and forests; the NAFSN spans a climate space largely representative of the forested areas in North America, with notable gaps in warmer tropical climates. Modern fires are burning in similar climate spaces as historical fires, but disproportionately in warmer regions compared to the historical record, possibly related to under-sampling of warm subtropical forests or supporting observations of changing fire regimes. The historical influence of Indigenous and non-Indigenous human land use on fire regimes varies in space and time. A 20th century fire deficit associated with human activities is evident in many regions, yet fire regimes characterized by frequent surface fires are still active in some areas (e.g., Mexico and the southeastern United States). These analyses provide a foundation and framework for future studies using the hundreds of thousands of annually- to sub-annually-resolved tree-ring records of fire spanning centuries, which will further advance our understanding of the interactions among fire, climate, topography, vegetation, and humans across North America

The James Webb Space Telescope Mission

Twenty-six years ago a small committee report, building on earlier studies, expounded a compelling and poetic vision for the future of astronomy, calling for an infrared-optimized space telescope with an aperture of at least $4m$. With the support of their governments in the US, Europe, and Canada, 20,000 people realized that vision as the $6.5m$ James Webb Space Telescope. A generation of astronomers will celebrate their accomplishments for the life of the mission, potentially as long as 20 years, and beyond. This report and the scientific discoveries that follow are extended thank-you notes to the 20,000 team members. The telescope is working perfectly, with much better image quality than expected. In this and accompanying papers, we give a brief history, describe the observatory, outline its objectives and current observing program, and discuss the inventions and people who made it possible. We cite detailed reports on the design and the measured performance on orbit.Comment: Accepted by PASP for the special issue on The James Webb Space Telescope Overview, 29 pages, 4 figure

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Innovation for Vulnerable Farmers: Drought and Water Scarcity Adaptation Technologies.

This report is a summary of themes discussed during a two-day workshop on “Innovation for Vulnerable Farmers: Drought and Water Scarcity Adaptation Technologies.” The workshop was held at Harvard University on September 11–12, 2014. It brought together a diverse group of scholars to explore how actors in the agriculture innovation system can better promote the needs of small and marginal farmers