2013-05-01 17:02:04 // Skye Wishart
| 1 comment
National Science Challenges came into being because basically, in Sir Peter Gluckman’s words, “Science makes our lives better and our country richer”. They were announced today by Minister Steven Joyce – with news also that the budget has been boosted by an extra $73.5 million on top of the $60 million set aside in last year’s budget.
2013-03-21 10:18:12 // Shaun Hendy
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
If I asked you to place a value on a car, you might well go to Trade Me and see what cars of that particular make, model and year were selling for. Unfortunately, it turns out that scientific knowledge cannot can be valued this way.
2013-03-20 13:25:35 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
It’s been 10 years since a government taskforce set out a lofty plan to turbocharge the New Zealand biotech sector, including a fivefold increase in core biotech companies to 1,000 and lifting biotech export value to $1 billion a year. But has the industry managed to hit those targets? And if not, what's holding it back?
2013-02-20 15:49:23 // Vincent Heeringa
// The Idealog Blog
| 2 comments
Our own universities all sport incubators and tech transfer offices. But one I visited in Aachen, Germany, is the smartest so far.
2013-02-05 14:59:05 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
A two-day symposium celebrating the life and work of the late Professor Sir Paul Callaghan is to be held in Wellington from February 18 to 19, organised by Victoria University and the MacDiarmid Institute.
2013-01-23 14:16:59 // Liam Condon
// The Idealog Blog
The time is now for a greener revolution in agriculture, to increase the productivity of farming in a more sustainable and environmentally compatible way.
2013-01-18 14:06:18 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
Skeptical Science is fighting climate change deniers with facts. Here's a two-minute video in which they deconstruct global warming patterns, accounting for weather variations as well as human contributions.
2012-12-17 15:46:05 // Idealog
Living Cell Technologies will work with Japan's Otsuka Pharmaceutical Factory to co-develop its NTCELL product for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease and other neurological disorders.
2012-11-29 15:00:08 // Idealog
The Prime Minister’s Science Prizes for 2012 have been handed out and the top award, worth $500,000, has been awarded to Professors Paul Moughan and Harjinder Singh from Massey University.
2012-11-26 10:19:28 // Wayne Linklater
// The Idealog Blog
Innovating is hard and getting harder. It is becoming more difficult to be novel – at least alone and early in life.
2012-11-23 12:38:11 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
A wireless vibration sensor being developed by a Victoria University student could provide a low-cost solution for engineers to monitor the damage of buildings affected by earthquakes – and, more impressively, harnesses the kinetic energy generated by the tremors in order to power itself.
2012-11-15 09:24:08 // Idealog
The Advanced Technology Institute will be named after Paul Callaghan in honour of his contributions to New Zealand science.
2012-11-12 10:08:10 // Siouxsie Wiles
// The Idealog Blog
Yesterday saw the launch of the Great NZ Science Project, a TV and web campaign that is part of the government’s new $60 million National Science Challenges initiative announced earlier this year.
2012-10-31 10:37:50 // Esther Goh
// Idealog #42: features
Canterbury Scientific’s 2011 surge in revenue earned the company a spot among the Technology Investment Network’s annual list of New Zealand’s ‘Top 10 Hot Emerging Companies’. A year on, it’s doubled in size, thanks in no small part to its cornerstone product, the HbA1c – a blood test used in the management of diabetes.
2012-10-26 10:00:13 // Peter Kerr
// The Idealog Blog
By the look of things, maybe we should accept that the Advanced Technology Institute won’t be up and running by February.
2012-07-23 10:13:44 // James Robinson
// Idealog #40: features
Izon Science has grown to 17 times its previous size in the past three years. Now the nano company has opened a Massachusetts office to service the burgeoning American market. James Robinson charts its rise and peeks into its future.
2012-07-17 09:38:16 // Peter Kerr
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
Nelson-based Nutrizeal, a manufacturer of natural products, doesn’t have its own R&D department.
2012-07-16 09:09:27 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
First-year Canterbury University student, 17-year-old Hadleigh Frost, was the winner of the first ever Sir Paul Callaghan Premier Award for Young Science Orators this week, presented by Callaghan's widow Miang Lim.
2012-07-05 16:11:31 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
When does suspension of disbelief go too far on the big screen? Local company Biomatters pokes some fun at the evolutionary science of Prometheus.
2012-06-29 12:45:06 // Stewart Forsyth
// The Idealog Blog
| 2 comments
How do we get more of the innovative businesses New Zealand so desperately needs? Perhaps the answer lies in science.
2012-06-25 10:41:32 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
| 9 comments
Science may struggle with a bit of an image problem (and projects like This Is What A Scientist Looks Like are working to combat this) but in attempting to attract more women into the sciences, the EU has gotten it so very wrong.
2012-06-12 10:10:36 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
Standout scientist or aspiring business leader? Step up and shake the governmental money tree – both the Prime Minister’s Science Prizes and Prime Minister’s Business Scholarships are now accepting applications for the year.
2012-06-08 10:15:20 // Idealog
Waikato scientists have come up with a novel method of purifying water while simultaneously disinfecting it against microbial contamination, which is now being developed for residential, commercial, horticultural and agricultural use.
2012-06-07 12:44:35 // Bryan Walker
// The Idealog Blog
| 5 comments
A recent study in Nature Climate Change by Dan Kahan and others has attracted interest for its findings on public apathy over climate change.
2012-06-01 13:04:12 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
Auckland and US researchers are working to develop needle-free jet injections that can administer drugs with less pain and more accuracy.
2012-05-28 10:25:41 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
The scientific community has plenty of cause for celebration now the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) Organisation has finally announced the world's largest radio telescope will be shared between Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
2012-05-28 09:49:11 // Shaun Hendy
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
The good news is that private sector R&D spending has been growing in New Zealand. The bad news is that this spending is not coming from the industries where most of our science graduates are likely to work.
2012-05-24 14:30:39 // Esther Goh
Two Ministry of Economic Development funds have been cancelled in the latest budget with both the Enterprising Partnerships Fund and the Transformational Initiatives Fund disestablished, bringing back $26.1 million over the next four years into the government fold.
2012-05-11 10:17:18 // Idealog
The University of Auckland has joined the MacDiarmid Institute's partner network, cementing a long-standing relationship between the organisations.
2012-05-04 12:19:22 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
Graeme Fielder is mixing science and business nous in his new startup, an online market for used lab and technical equipment.
2012-04-18 16:03:34 // Esther Goh
Auckland company Precept Health has just inked a deal to put its medical software and equipment into 39 Thai hospitals, bringing its global total to 46.
2012-04-17 13:12:08 // Peter Kerr
// The Idealog Blog
| 12 comments
At the risk of displaying a Wellington-residential and Southland upbringing bias, the government’s keenness for an Aucklandisation of our science and innovation strikes me as stupid.
2012-04-16 09:58:19 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
The Nelson-based Cawthron Institute says it has cracked a new and lucrative export market with rare organic compounds derived from algae.
2012-04-05 09:37:58 // Bryan Walker
// The Idealog Blog
If we are truly informed by sound science we will understand that “doing our fair share” is not a sufficient response in a world falling well short of doing what is necessary to prevent deeply disruptive levels of warming.
2012-04-03 15:29:37 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
For the first time New Zealand women have the chance to apply for a National Fellowship programme to support a career in science.
2012-04-02 09:58:33 // Grant Jacobs
// The Idealog Blog
| 3 comments
While TED lectures are advertised as being for ‘ideas worth spreading’, some local/regional TEDx events offer what I would describe as at best questionable topics or speakers.
2012-03-27 22:59:10 // Idealog
Turning a profit despite the GFC, breaking new markets, creating new technologies - it's all part of the hunt to find the best of the best in bioscience, and this year the mantle of NZBIO's Company of the Year was bestowed on Douglas Pharmaceuticals.
2012-03-26 23:28:57 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
As a small country, New Zealand can’t do everything, let alone do everything well. It’s time to zero in on a few key sectors and throw our weight behind them, says MSI chief executive Murray Bain.
2012-03-22 17:08:19 // Owen Poland
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
Imagine a leg of prime Kiwi lamb implanted with an edible Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tag that has tracked its journey from pasture to plate. Imagine, too, if the consumer’s ‘plate’ could read the tag and thereby ‘pump out’ all sorts of information like calories or fat, details about the lamb’s ‘trading’ history and even food miles.
2012-03-20 17:09:13 // Dwight Whitney
// The Idealog Blog
Cutting edge research by a group of New Zealanders is changing the way we think about diet and, more significantly, what the farmers of the future will be producing.
2012-03-20 12:17:49 // Aimee Whitcroft
// The Idealog Blog
Welcome, dear readers, to the most recent foray into the new, very exciting (and entirely necessary, given the increasing squeeze on science funding from all fronts) world of crowdfunded science/research: Petridish.
2012-03-19 13:29:01 // Peter Griffin
// The Idealog Blog
Wellington is abuzz with news of the super ministry, which was unveiled last week and will have major implications for a large number of public servants.
2012-03-12 14:41:41 // Idealog
| 1 comment
It's a big spot to fill, but the next president of the Royal Society of New Zealand, the University of Otago’s previous Vice-Chancellor Professor Sir David Skegg, has a pedigree that will stand him well.
2012-03-12 10:30:55 // Peter Griffin
// The Idealog Blog
It's looking less and less likely that New Zealand will be selected to host the Square Kilometre Array, a $2.7 billion radio telescope project.
2012-03-08 12:23:49 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
| 2 comments
Academy Award winner Mark Sagar is out to take computer animation to a new level by starting a new laboratory at the University of Auckland.
2012-02-22 14:30:49 // Idealog
// The Idealog Blog
New Zealand must embrace science in order to be a truly innovative nation, Massey University vice-chancellor Steve Maharey told a conference in Wellington today.
2012-02-20 09:35:12 // Esther Goh
Bioscience-based organisations earned at least $677 million for New Zealand last year, with the majority of that coming from exports.
2012-02-14 10:02:38 // Idealog
Plant & Food Research is setting up a new portfolio for seafood research to be run by Danette Olsen, previously the group manager for aquaculture and biotechnology at the Cawthron Institute.
2012-02-13 10:27:20 // Siobhan Leathley
// The Idealog Blog
The EU is on a drive to recruit talented scientists from around the world, and three Kiwis are already leading the way.
2012-02-07 12:48:26 // Esther Goh
| 2 comments
3D printing has given an elderly woman a new jaw in what doctors say is the first operation of its kind.
2012-01-31 14:26:38 // Siobhan Leathley
// The Idealog Blog
The Kiwi Innovation Network (KiwiNet) has launched a database of national research projects, inventions and patents, with an eye to connecting businesses, entrepreneurs and investors worldwide.
2012-01-31 09:39:23 // Siobhan Leathley
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
Researchers at Bio Architecture Lab and the University of Washington in Seattle have created a microbe capable of digesting seaweed and converting it into fuel.
2012-01-23 13:49:57 // Sustain Team
// The Idealog Blog
A natural substance obtained from the seeds of a "miracle tree" could be the answer to inexpensive water purification in the developing world, US scientists say.
2011-12-19 10:02:44 // Kate Beecroft
Manuka Health has announced its arrival as a serious biotech player with the potential for multi-million dollar exports.
2011-12-16 11:00:11 // Kate Beecroft
The Prime Minister’s Science Prizes, which deal in both glory and cold hard cash from a pool of $1 million, have been presented in Auckland today.
2011-12-14 14:30:45 // Siobhan Leathley
The New Zealand bioscience sector is showing healthy growth but too many young companies are being driven overseas, a New Zealand Bio Industry report released yesterday suggests.
2011-12-12 09:29:33 // Deirdre Robert
// Idealog #36: features
| 1 comment
Creating fibres naked to the human eye is at the heart of what the Revolution Fibres team does. But add some secret sauce to these fibres and suddenly there's the potential to overturn the cosmetics, health and electronics markets. And that's just for starters.
2011-12-02 09:41:42 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
| 1 comment
Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, chief science adviser to the Prime Minister, is a staunch champion of science as a pillar of economic development and innovation. And turning Auckland into a major Asia-Pacific innovation hub will be the topic du jour when he speaks in Auckland next week.
2011-11-24 10:48:12 // Esther Goh
Kiwi biotech company Photonz has reached a new milestone on the path to commercially manufacturing eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) from marine microalgae.
2011-11-24 09:24:15 // Andy Kenworthy
// Idealog #36: features
Stephen Ford is into mushrooms. He's growing tiny fungal spores that kill off pests, boring through their skin and sucking out their insides.
2011-11-17 09:37:55 // Idealog
Christchurch biochemist Professor Christine Winterbourn last night became the first woman ever to receive the country's highest science and technology honour – the Rutherford Medal.
2011-11-14 16:23:40 // Idealog
The government is certainly keen to prove its commitment to science and technological innovation – its newest policy will involve pumping $60 million into a series of 'National Science Challenges' to stimulate R&D.
2011-11-07 17:10:20 // Idealog
Dunedin-based Pacific Edge has added to its suite of patents with new ones issued in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand for its technology for the detection of gastric cancer.
2011-11-04 13:32:46 // Pattrick Smellie
// The Idealog Blog
For three years, Prime Minister John Key has talked a good game on the importance of innovation policy, but it took an election – and perhaps just a touch of Prime Ministerial frustration – to force the pace on the long-stalled plans for Industrial Research Ltd.
2011-11-04 11:40:55 // Sarah Robson
| 1 comment
More funding will be injected into the science sector to transform Industrial Research Limited (IRL) into an advanced technology institute, Prime Minister John Key announced yesterday.
2011-11-01 15:40:29 // Deirdre Coleman
// Idealog #36: workshop
| 2 comments
For AUT University’s Kelly Sheerin, the Rugby World Cup experience isn’t quite finished.
2011-10-28 13:19:57 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
Green growth is gaining traction in Europe, and it's time New Zealand followed suit, the University of Auckland's head of economics says.
2011-10-24 09:01:56 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
In the grand scale of things, New Zealand may be a mere speck at the bottom of the globe – but we’ve got a role to play on the world stage, if we’re prepared to seize the opportunity.
2011-10-06 10:33:44 // Idealog
New Zealand scientists and flu researchers have beaten out international competition to be awarded a five-year, multi-million dollar contract to study influenza in an effort to better understand the debilitating virus and how to prevent its spread.
2011-09-22 16:13:20 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
| 2 comments
Professor Sir Paul Callaghan has written a business plan for New Zealand – and it doesn’t include winning the World Cup.
2011-09-22 10:02:41 // Idealog
A Kiwi nanotech company has cut the ribbon at its new US headquarters, located in the growing science and tech hub of Massachusetts.
2011-09-19 17:14:05 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
Two Kiwis are behind what has been dubbed an 'eBay for science', an online marketplace that connects scientists to other institutions with the equipment and means to carry out experiments that their own universities do not have.
2011-09-13 10:11:16 // Idealog
New Zealand and the UK are forging new ground in the science and innovation sector with a new working group to be set up following the signing of an agreement yesterday.
2011-09-12 09:31:49 // Idealog
| 2 comments
The world’s top international agricultural biotechnology conference is heading to New Zealand in 2012, putting the spotlight on environmental, social, and economic change under the umbrella theme ‘Adapting to a Changing World’.
2011-09-07 12:12:32 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
Increasing use of nanotechnology in consumer products has triggered interest in whether the potential risks arising from the technology are being adequately regulated, and the government has just released a report on the issue.
2011-09-01 09:55:18 // Esther Goh
// The Idealog Blog
A team of Massey University engineering students is building software for New Zealand's first spacecraft, which could pave the way for a new generation of satellites monitoring climate change by measuring polar ice thickness and other environmental data.
2011-08-05 09:21:35 // Esther Goh
Kiwi scientists are making big strides in the field of cancer medicine, revealing two new drug advances yesterday which could reduce the side effects of traditional treatments.
2011-08-01 10:52:04 // Esther Goh
Dr Dianne Gleeson has won the inaugural Women in Science Entrepreneurship Award, receiving $50,000 of venture development advice and access to an international advisory board with experience in science commercialisation.
2011-07-26 11:19:19 // Esther Goh
A New Zealand company has secured $1 million to help advance development of its technology to diagnose prostate cancer.
2011-07-20 16:13:50 // Esther Goh
A New Zealand secondary school team is on its way home from the International Biology Olympiad in Taiwan—bringing a hat-trick of medals along with them.
2011-07-13 11:15:28 // Vanessa Ellingham
The Kiwi Innovation Network will help homegrown projects "excite and harness investor appetite", according to one of its founding members.
2011-07-11 11:24:29 // Duncan Greive
// Idealog #34: features
What if we could access solar energy as easily and cheaply as the grid? An idealistic young Kiwi is at the centre of a technology that could radically reshape the global economy.
2010-03-26 09:16:56 // Bette Flagler
// Idealog #26: features
There’s something odd about the very small: weird physics and some very big money. Bette Flagler meets the New Zealanders making giant strides at a nano scale.
2010-03-04 14:10:33 // Vincent Heeringa
// Idealog #26: features
| 3 comments
Catch those upstart Aussies by 2025. That’s the aim of John Key and his young Turks. Dream on, John. Government inaction and the biggest recession in 70 years are conspiring to bring us level with the home of Borat by 2025. Vincent Heeringa reckons we need a better plan to avoid becoming New Zealistan.
2010-02-12 16:03:54 // James Hurman
// The Idealog Blog
My ‘wow’ moment of today was the discovery of an American barista who knows how to make a flat white. The ‘wow’ moment for everybody else was ex Microsoft CTO Nathan Myhrvold.
2010-02-12 09:34:03 // Jehan Casinader
// Idealog #25: features
With our major export sectors under pressure, the science sector could become the saviour of our economy—but first, says Jehan Casinader, it seems we need to save science.
2009-10-01 12:21:48 // Deirdre Coleman & Deirdre Robert
// Idealog TV
New Zealand’s clean green image of pristine fiords, beaches and forests may be an asset for our tourism and export industries, but when it comes to our seafood exports, looking good isn't enough. AUT senior lecturer in Marine Ecology and Aquaculture, Dr Andrea Alfaro, is working hard to improve the health and production of our commercially farmed selfish, in particular our native green-lipped mussels and paua.
2009-09-15 13:56:31 // Paul Reynolds
// Idealog #23: workshop
| 1 comment
Innovation always has a history. Two books remind us that the present isn’t the only age of wonder.
2009-08-21 09:41:07 // Matt Cooney
// The Idealog Blog
In July 2005, AUT University Professor Sergei Gulyaev and his colleagues spent a series of cold evenings huddled in Karaka, South Auckland, pointing a portable telescope at a plasma disc and black hole 4.5 billion light years away. Their efforts have had a result: New Zealand could be part of the next great scientific adventure.
2009-07-14 16:55:25 // Deirdre Coleman & Deirdre Robert
// Idealog TV
It might sound like science fiction, but being able to accurately predict and offer customised treatment for disease based on an individual’s genetic makeup, plus social and environmental factors, is well within reach, according to Professor Nikola Kasabov of AUT University.
2009-03-27 11:29:58 // Jamie Cullinane
// Idealog #21: features
| 3 comments
Of all the differences between people, one factor has a greater bearing on income than any other: intelligence. And IQ scores show that each generation is getting smarter. Jamie Cullinane examines the rise of the smartocracy
2009-02-12 07:32:14 // Bette Flagler
// Idealog #20: workshop
Evolutionary biologists don’t spend all their time looking backwards. At the Allan Wilson Centre, Kiwi scientists are predicting the future
2008-11-07 15:22:38 // Lauren Bartlett
// Idealog #18: features
Despite the perception of science as a dull and dusty undertaking, Priv Bradoo and other young Kiwis are collaborating, commercialising and capturing our imagination. Lauren Bartlett meets the new rock stars of New Zealand science. Plus those that lead the way
2008-02-21 11:29:27 // Bette Flagler
// Idealog #13: features
Our kiwifruit industry was built by combining the Chinese gooseberry with Kiwi know-how. Now a New Zealand company is returning the favour, working with Chinese growers to raise the plants needed for its natural, healthy sweetener. But they need to step carefully, reports Bette Flagler—Big Sugar is watching
2007-10-03 20:23:34 // Gena Tuffery
// Idealog #11: now
Holding the balance of life and death in your hands isn’t a game—except when it is. New Zealand-based GoVirtualMedical has finally replaced the medieval med-student practice of practicing on a prone body with a professional multimedia version of the battery-powered board game, Operation
2007-07-26 23:00:00 // Mic Dover
// Idealog #10: features
The future’s bright, the future’s a personalised smoothie—just tap your genetic code into the virtual grocer. Mic Dover meets the Kiwis who are reinventing what we eat
