Champion Island: Well done, socioeconomic scrappers! You win the first week of March on points – and with the tough workweek ready to fall, a hard-fought weekend awaits.
Just one more round before we cool down. Finish strong, innovation champion – and before you muscle up, stay loose with this weekly innovation review.
Think inside the box: Choose your favorite on National Cereal Day.
Breakfast of champions: Today is March 7 and we’re swinging away with a first-meal-of-the-day menu – you can flip out for National Flapjack Day or flake out for National Cereal Day (or both, if you’re hungry).
Today is also National Be Heard Day, and we’d understand – in light of the aforementioned breakfast theme – if you interpreted that as something to do with Snap, Crackle and Pop. But it’s actually an homage to small-business marketing in an era of big-businesses media domination.
Dinner of … champions? Since we started with breakfast, it seems logical to end with dinner, especially since March 7 is also National Crown Roast of Pork Day – a tough sell today for both Gentiles and Jews, since it’s a meatless Friday during Lent and Jewish diners are unlikely to order unkosher swine on any date, but there it is.
Banks on it: Also putting the meat before the salad is the Royal Institution of Great Britain, England’s home for scientific education and research, founded on this date in 1799 in the home of Royal Society of London President Joseph Banks.
Hole lot better: Also sewing up a spot in history was Missouri-based inventor Charles Miller, who patented his upgraded sewing machine on March 7, 1854. (There had been other sewing machines, but none that could stitch buttonholes.)
Phoning it in: Alexander Graham Bell famously invented the telephone … or did he?
Down to the wire: Speaking of similar-but-different inventions, Alexander Graham Bell edged out rival innovator Elisha Gray when he patented the telephone on this date in 1876. (Gray had filed to patent a similar telephonic device on Feb. 14 of that year – the same day Bell filed for his patent.)
Long distance: Bell’s patent was put to good use exactly 50 years later, when the first transatlantic telephone call connected AT&T President Walter Gifford in New York City and Secretary of the General Post Office Sir Evelyn Murray in London on March 7, 1926. (The wireless connection was made via radio telephone, for those keeping score).
Really long distance: And it was this date in 1996 when NASA and European Space Agency astronomers released the first images of the surface of distant dwarf planet Pluto, courtesy of the Hubble Space Telescope.
The images – actually captured during a six-day stretch in 1994 – showcase Pluto’s entire surface, revealing a complex landscape of icy basins and craters.
Shock jock: Austrian psychiatrist and neurologist Julius Wagner-Jauregg (1857-1940) – who won a Nobel prize for battling syphilitic meningoencephalitis (by giving patients malaria) and pioneered shock therapy – would be 168 years old today.
Beyond her years: Amanda Gorman had already accomplished more than most when she burst onto the national scene in 2021.
Also born on March 7 were Scottish outlaw Rob Roy (born Robert MacGregor, 1671-1734), a Robin Hood-type whose exploits as a Highland hero may have been slightly exaggerated; American social worker, author and philanthropist Joseph Lee (1862-1937), remembered as the founder of the American playground movement; American forester and activist Bernard Frank (1902-1964), who co-founded The Wilderness Society with seven other conservationists; American astronomer and astronomy professor Alan Hale (born 1958), who co-discovered Comet Hale-Bopp with amateur stargazer Thomas Bopp; and American actress and podcaster Jenna Fischer (born Regina Marie Kirk, 1974), who conquered cancer after surviving “The Office.”
Still climbing: And take a bow, Amanda S.C. Gorman! The African American poet, activist, model and cum laude graduate of Harvard University – who became America’s first National Youth Poet Laureate in 2017 and impressed at President Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration – turns 27 today.
Give the vaunted versifier your best at editor@innovateli.com, where we’re most interested in your writing talents (especially your news tips and calendar events).
About our sponsor: The Long Island Business Development Council has helped build the regional economy for 56 years by bringing together government economic development officials, developers, financial experts and others for education, debate and networking.
BUT FIRST, THIS
Czech mark: Stony Brook University has added another prestigious Fulbright Scholarship to its faculty-wide résumé.
Distinguished Teaching Professor Marci Lobel, a member of SBU’s Department of Psychology, has been named a Fulbright Distinguished Scholar for the 2025-26 academic year. The U.S. Department of State and the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, a U.S. Congress-designated panel overseeing the Fulbright Program, selected Lobel for her expertise in the deleterious health effects of stress – particularly its effects on reproductive health, including several factors that elevate and alleviate stress levels in pregnant women and their offspring.
Next up for Lobel, a summa cum laude graduate of Harvard University, is a full academic year at Masaryk University in the Czech Republic, where she will conduct research on stress in pregnant Czech women and teach the unique Psychology of Women’s Health course that she created at SBU. “We’re thrilled that Dr. Lobel has received this award,” noted Distinguished Professor Joanne Davila, chairwoman of the Department of Psychology. “She’s so well-deserving of it. It’s an important opportunity both for her and for her colleagues in the Czech Republic.”
Room for improvement: Mount Sinai South Nassau’s new-and-improved Fennessey Family Emergency Department is officially open for business.
This is an emergency: Following a five-year, $50 million renovation, Mount Sinai South Nassau Hospital has officially opened the doors of its expanded Emergency Department.
On Tuesday, the Oceanside-based flagship of the New York City-based Mount Sinai Health System ceremoniously celebrated the Fennessy Family Emergency Department, a football field-sized Level II Trauma Center featuring centralized nursing stations, bedside triage and a state-of-the-art trauma unit that actually opened in 2023. The department – named for longtime benefactor and former Mount Sinai South Nassau Board Chairman Joseph Fennessy – anchors the four-story, 100,000-square-foot Feil Family Pavilion, which is slated to open in stages throughout the year.
The sprawling Fennessey ER was funded by a Superstorm Sandy recovery grant from FEMA and more than $10 million in donations, according to the Mount Sinai Health System. “We are taking emergency medicine on the South Shore to a new level,” noted Mount Sinai South Nassau Hospital President Adhi Sharma. “Every aspect of this Emergency Department – from the entrance to the waiting area to the reception and triage areas to the patient treatment rooms – has been designed to provide our patients with advanced emergency care and a first-rate experience.”
TOP OF THE SITE
Say what? A Stony Brook University scientist has identified complex linguistic patterns in the songs of whales – very similar to patterns found in dozens of human languages.
Finger on the pulse (with salt, pepper and ketchup): Association For a Better Long Island Executive Director Kyle Strober joins “Spark: The Innovate Long Island Podcast” to discuss important IDAs, troublesome taxes and the best BEC in all of Merrick.
ICYMI
British energy giant BP has withdrawn a key New York State transmission application, but there’s still hope for its ambitious Beacon Wind offshore energy farm – and New York State’s carbon-free aspirations.
Something to say? Welcome to The Entrepreneur’s Edge, Innovate Long Island’s new promoted-content news feature platform – a direct link from you to our innovation-focused audience. Progressive product to promote? Singular service to sell? Sociopolitical position to push? Shine a bright light on the big picture, the little details and everything in between with The Entrepreneur’s Edge. Living on the edge.
BEST OF THE WEST (AND SOMETIMES NORTH/SOUTH)
Innovate LI’s inbox overrunneth with inspirational innovations from all North American corners. This week’s brightest out-of-towners:
From California: Los Angeles-based med-tech iCardio.ai beams up a $1 million Roddenbery Foundation prize for its “Star Trek”-like heart-assessment technologies.
From Illinois: Chicago-based reading/entertainment startup Wendy launches a story-building toolbox app to kindle kids’ reading and writing instincts.
From California: Fremont-based nitrogen fertilizer frontrunner Nitricity announces funding strategy, ambitious plans for a $10 million state-of-the-art organic fertilizer plant.
ON THE MOVE
Robert Prezant
+ Robert Prezant has been appointed to the Long Island Regional Economic Development Council. Prezant, who will sit on the LIREDC’s Natural Assets & Tourism and Workforce Development & Education work groups, is the president of Farmingdale State University.
+ Daniel Aragona has been hired as a construction manager at Damianos Realty Group in Smithtown. He was a construction manager at The Marcus Organization in Farmingdale.
+ Garden City-based Moritt Hock & Hamroff has hired two associates:
- Joseph Townsend, now with the Litigation and Creditors’ Rights, Restructuring & Bancruptcy practice groups, was an attorney at Ronkonkoma-based Campolo Middleton McCormick.
- Deborah Turofsky, now with the Creditors’ Rights, Restructuring & Bankruptcy Practice Group, was an attorney at Jericho-based Rimon PC.
+ Addie Blanco-Havey has been promoted to director of operations at Garden City-based Premier Endodontics of Long Island. She was regional manager.
+ Nicholas Ennella has been hired as an innovation manager at Melville-based H2M architects + engineers. He was a product development mechanical engineering manager at Sartorius in Bohemia.
+ Marc Schneider has been appointed co-chairman of the New York State Bar Association’s Condominiums and Cooperatives Committee. He is managing partner at Schneider Buchel in Woodbury.
+ Joseph Prinzo has joined the Board of Directors of the Garden City-based Family & Children’s Association. He is the senior manager of business development at Westbury-based Jovia Financial Credit Union.
+ Bohemia-based P.W. Grosser Consulting has announced several promotions:
- Kylie Benz is now a senior hydrogeologist. She was a field hydrogeologist.
- Ryan Vaughn is now a project engineer. He was a staff engineer.
- Harry de Haas is now a project engineer. He was a staff engineer.
- El Jaworski is now a project engineer. She was a staff engineer.
- Kylie McClay is now a project hydrogeologist. She was a field hydrogeologist.
+ Steven Favata has been hired as a project designer 1 at Melville-based H2M architects + engineers. He was a project captain at Babylon-based SRF Architect.
Like this newsletter? Innovate Long Island newsletter, website and podcast sponsorships are a prime opportunity to reach the inventors, investors, entrepreneurs and executives you need to know (just ask the LIBDC). Gregory Zeller can tell you more.
BELOW THE FOLD (Clean Energy – Plus Birds – Edition)
Wing and a prayer: Wind turbines kill thousands of birds every year.
Bird brained: Trump’s war on clean energy is killing jobs and raising electricity costs.
Two birds, one stone: Scientists turn CO2 and battery waste into methane fuel.
For the birds: Making wind turbines safer for our feathered friends.
Early bird: Please continue supporting the fantastic firms that support Innovate Long Island, including the Long Island Business Development Council, which is now accepting sponsorships for its 55th annual Economic Development Conference, coming this October to Montauk. Check them out.
