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Integrated circuits, brain sciences, genetics and biotechnology, clinical medicine and health care, and deep Earth, sea, space and polar exploration were named as the other five sectors that will be given priority in terms of funding and resources, according to a draft of the government’s 14th five-year plan for 2021–25, and its vision through 2035.


‘Basic research is the wellspring of scientific and technological innovation, so we’ll boost spending in this area by a considerable sum,’ Premier Li Keqiang says.

The Future Of Food And Beverage Innovation And Venturing — Dr. Ellen De Brabander, Ph.D. — Senior Vice President, R&D, PepsiCo


Dr. Ellen de Brabander, is Senior Vice President, Research and Development, at PepsiCo, the American multinational food, snack, and beverage company.

Dr. de Brabander has broad set of responsibilities at Pepsico and currently leads their global R&D functions including the Food Safety, Quality, Strategy & Portfolio Management, and their Sensory and Regulatory Affairs teams. She also leads their R&D Digital Transformation initiatives to transform the innovation process to bring new, innovative products to the market.

Dr. de Brabander is also a member of the board of governors at the New York Academy of Sciences and has served as Treasurer and board member International Life Science Institute of North America, an organization that brings together scientists from government, academia and industry to uphold the scientific integrity and objectivity of nutrition and food safety science in order to ethically improve food systems for the betterment of public health.

Additionally, Dr. de Brabander has also served as the interim and founding CEO of EIT Food (part of the EU’s European Institute of Innovation and Technology), which is a unique $1.5 Billion Euro innovation consortium with more than 50 partners from industry and academia, focused on transforming the food sector by designing and delivering unique and high impact research, innovation, business creation and education programs.

The 15-member commission calls a $40 billion investment to expand and democratize AI research and development a “modest down payment for future breakthroughs,” and encourages an attitude toward investment in innovation from policymakers akin that which led to building the interstate highway system in the 1950s. Ultimately, the group envisions hundreds of billions of dollars of spending on AI by the federal government in the coming years.


The National Security Commission on AI report makes recommendations ranging from 5G and China to immigration policy and civil rights.

Archer Aviation, the electric aircraft startup that recently announced a deal to go public via a merger with a blank-check company, plans to launch a network of its urban air taxis in Los Angeles by 2024.

The announcement comes two months after the formation of the Urban Air Mobility Partnership, a one-year initiative between Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s office, the Los Angeles Department of Transportation and Urban Movement Labs to develop a plan for how to integrate urban aircraft into existing transportation networks and land use policies. Urban Movement Labs, launched in November 2019, is a public-private partnership involving local government and companies to develop, test and deploy transportation technologies. Urban Movement Labs and the city of Los Angeles are working on the design and access of “vertiports,” where people can go to fly on an “urban air mobility” aircraft. Urban air mobility, or UAM, is industry-speak for a highly automated aircraft that can operate and transport passengers or cargo at lower altitudes within urban and suburban areas.

Archer Aviation’s announcement comes two weeks since it landed United Airlines as a customer and an investor in its bid to become a publicly traded company via a merger with a special purpose acquisition company. Archer Aviation reached an agreement in early February to merge with special purpose acquisition company Atlas Crest Investment Corp., an increasingly common financial path that allows the startup to eschew the once traditional IPO process. The combined company, which will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange with ticker symbol “ACHR,” will have an equity valuation of $3.8 billion.

After over a decade of research and development around hydrogen fuel technology, President Cyril Ramaphosa says South Africa is now ready to manufacture and commercialise hydrogen fuels technology.

The President said this when he responded to a debate on the State of the Nation Address in Parliament on Thursday.

For more than a decade, government has been working with various partners, including the private sector and academia, to develop hydrogen fuel cell and lithium battery storage technologies.

Dr. Hassan A. Tetteh, MD, is the Health Mission Chief, at the Department of Defense (DoD) Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, serving to advance the objectives of the DoD AI Strategy, and improve war fighter healthcare and readiness with artificial intelligence implementations.

Dr. Tetteh is also an Associate Professor of Surgery at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, adjunct faculty at Howard University College of Medicine, a Thoracic Staff Surgeon for MedStar Health and Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and leads a Specialized Thoracic Adapted Recovery (STAR) Team, in Washington, DC, where his research in thoracic transplantation aims to expand heart and lung recovery and save lives.

In the past, Dr. Tetteh has served as Chief Medical Informatics Officer, United States Navy, and Division Lead for Futures and Innovation at Navy Medicine’s Headquarters, a Command Surgeon for the National Defense University, and as a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellow, assigned to the U.S. Congress, Congressional Budget Office, (CBO).

Dr. Tetteh served as Ship’s Surgeon and Director of Surgical Services for the USS Carl Vinson battle group in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, deployed as a trauma surgeon to Afghanistan’s Helmand and Nimroz provinces in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, and has supported special joint forces missions to South America, the Middle East, the South Pacific, Australia, and Africa. He earned both the Surface Warfare Medical Department Officer and Fleet Marine Force Qualified Officer designations, and his military honors include two Meritorious Service Medals and the Joint Service Commendation Medal.

Dr. Tetteh is also an accomplished author, including the novel “Gifts of the Heart”, “Star Patrol” (co-authored with his son Edmund Tetteh), as well as “The Art of Human Care” and “The Art of Human Care for COVID-19″ (illustrated by his daughter Ella Bleue), and has published numerous articles on surgical innovation, health information technology, ethics, wounded warriors, and process improvement. He also serves on the board of directors for the Brooklyn, New York based Arthur Ashe Institute for Urban Health, Fayetteville, Arkansas based Champions for Kids, and Miriam’s Kitchen, a Washington, D.C. based nonprofit that works to end chronic homelessness.

Dr. Tetteh received his B.S. from State University of New York (SUNY), his M.D. from SUNY Downstate Medical Center, his M.P.A. from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, M.B.A. from Johns Hopkins University Carey Business School, and M.S. in National Security Strategy with a concentration in Artificial Intelligence from the National War College. He completed his thoracic surgery fellowship at the University of Minnesota and advanced cardiac surgery fellowship at Harvard Medical School’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Dr. Tetteh is a Certified Professional in Healthcare Information and Management, board certified in thoracic surgery, general surgery, clinical informatics, and healthcare management, and is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons and Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives.