The Technion’s story has been intertwined with Israel’s for more than a century, from laying the foundations for a new nation to shaping its future.
Professor Shulamit Levenberg of the Technion Faculty of Biomedical Engineering, director of both the Technion Center for 3D Bioprinting and the Rina & Avner Schneur Center for Diabetes Research, was recently chosen as a fellow of the American National Academy of Inventors (NAI). Her nomination will be officially announced during NAI’s annual conference in North Carolina in June. Prof. Levenberg is among a handful of Israeli women scientists who have created the most innovative technologies and has registered dozens of patents. She has founded several startups, including Aleph Farms, which creates cultivated steak using cattle cells with no harm to…
We interview Sandhya Sriram (SS) from Shiok Meats, Shulamit Levenberg (SL) from the Technion and Aleph Farms and Timothy Olsen (TO) from Merck on the current status, challenges and future directions of cultured meat. SS: Shiok Meats, established in 2018, is a cultivated, cell-based meat and seafood company, headquartered in Singapore. It is the first of its kind in Singapore and South-East Asia with a mission to bring delicious, sustainable and healthy shrimp, lobster, crab and meats to your table, by harvesting from cells instead of animals. Our meats are animal-, health- and environment-friendly with similar taste and texture compared to…
A new app has created a virtual sisterhood for thousands of women across Israel, giving them a safe space to share their experiences, their problems and even just their thoughts – particularly in wartime. The Soli app allows users to anonymously express their state of mind and their feelings, called Moods on the app, ranging from common emotions like happy, stressed or lonely to more specific sentiments such as “in the mood for a night out,” “looking for new friends” and “in need of advice.” Opening the app takes the user to a map, where they see other users and their Moods,…
Preeclampsia is a life-threatening pregnancy complication that affects approximately 5% of women, and is the leading cause of pregnancy-related death. New findings by Technion researchers indicate that early-onset and late-onset preeclampsia are, in fact, not the same disease. Understanding these findings could lead to better diagnosis, treatment, and survival rates. Preeclampsia is often detected during routine prenatal visits as new-onset hypertension. It is caused by abnormalities in the placenta – the organ of the fetus that enables the transfer of oxygen and nutrients from the mother to the fetus. In severe cases, preeclampsia may damage the mother’s organs, such as…
The rate of childhood peanut allergies from birth to 18 years old is three to four times higher compared to 20 years ago. Those with a severe allergy can be sent into anaphylaxis just by smelling the legume. This can be especially problematic for those with allergies in Israel, as the country does not have standardized regulations that require uniform labeling of allergens on food packaging. But Technion alumna Dr. Mona Kidon may have a solution to this issue. She has created an immunotherapy that permits young peanut allergy sufferers to build up immunity to peanuts until they can ultimately…
When serial medical device inventor Dvir Keren became interested in developing a minimally invasive way to fill in bald areas caused by androgenetic alopecia — common in both men and women — he did not realize he’d be establishing a femtech company. But that’s what Hairstetics became, for the simple reason that 85 percent of women with androgenetic alopecia are not benefiting from natural hair transplantation procedures for what is called “male-pattern baldness” in men. “At the beginning, he was thinking about males,” says Hairstetics CEO Oren Ne’eman. “But when recruitment for clinical studies started, a lot of women came.” Keren learned that androgenetic alopecia in…
The gender gap in Israel’s startups is slowly narrowing, with women now accounting for 35 percent of all jobs. A report published by Start-Up Nation Policy Institute to mark International Women’s Day shows the number of women in startups is increasing, albeit slowly, up from 33.4 percent in 2021. Still, women account for just 16 percent of senior (C-level or C-suite) positions, and just seven percent of CTO (chief technical officers) positions. They fare best in senior roles as CMOs – chief marketing officers – at 35 percent. The findings are based on a database of all LinkedIn employees in…
For women suffering from alopecia, the loss of their hair can be traumatic and life altering. But an Israeli medical technology company has developed an injector to strongly affix multiple strands to the scalp at a time, providing immediate hair restoration to women struggling with baldness. Hairstetics, based in Or Yehuda on the outskirts of Tel Aviv, says its near-instant hair implants can restore a woman’s hair in less than an hour – and without surgical intervention. Hairstetics CEO Oren Ne’eman tells NoCamels that the implants are for women suffering from androgenetic alopecia, a genetic disorder characterized by permanent hair…
As applications and devices enabling more realistic virtual and augmented reality come to market — with 2023 widely forecast to be the year Apple releases its reportedly game-changing goggles — there’s an elephant in the room that could hamper the segment’s growth. Cybersickness. Between 38% and 66% of virtual and augmented reality users will experience dizziness, nausea and headache while plugged into their devices. It’s particularly pronounced during games but could also crop up in the midst of a video chat. Stress, online bullying, FOMO and isolation also can contribute to the phenomenon. Cybersickness is similar to seasickness in that your eyes, ears and…
The group from the Technion (L-R): Dr. Laure Arsenieff, postdoctoral fellow (from France); Camelia Shopen-Gochev, Israeli doctoral student; Prof. Debbie Lindell; Dr. Sigitas Šulčius, research fellow/academic visitor (from Lithuania). A team of primarily women, including a group from the Technion led by Professor Debbie Lindell of the Faculty of Biology, embarked on a research trip in the Pacific Ocean from January 22 to February 18. Their objective was to study the biological mechanisms that dictate the structures of diverse biological populations at different latitudes and under various environmental conditions. The Technion team focused primarily on the role of viruses in…
What happens when your vegan boyfriend wants to eat healthy but has little time for food prep? If the girlfriend is a Technion student, she just might come up with a solution. Neta Shimony was among a team of Technion graduate students participating in an international food-tech competition tasked with creating healthy processed food when her boyfriend’s dilemma sparked the idea for a tofu omelet mix. She and her teammates, from both the Faculty of Data & Decision Sciences and the Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering, developed an instant (just add water), freeze-dried, vegan, tofu-based omelet that comes in…
Lishai Neuman ’19 is a Ph.D. candidate in the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Faculty of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Her research is focused on harnessing new materials for the development of novel nanoelectronics devices, and spans a wide range of topics, including material fabrication, design, and characterization. It involves state-of-the-art characterization tools, such as atomic-resolution microscopes and a particle accelerator. Lishai’s latest advance, published in Advanced Functional Materials in 2023, presented a route for manipulating the electric properties of a material by precise control of the distance between two adjacent atoms. This fine-tuning of the material’s properties is part of…