Students from across Texas gathered in Galveston to attend the Innovation in Life Sciences Summer Camp to learn entrepreneurial solutions to healthcare and social problems. 

The University of Texas Medical Branch Innovation and Entrepreneurship team—part of the Vice President of Research office—organized the camp at the Texas A&M University Galveston Campus. Twenty-four undergraduate, graduate and post-doctoral students participated in sessions about entrepreneurial mindsets, startups in the health and life sciences, and community solutions.

“Students face a fast-changing world—technology is advancing rapidly, AI is playing an increasing role in work and play, and education is working hard to keep up,” said Dr. Dan Jupiter, UTMB campus director of Blackstone LaunchPad. “At the same time, our health care system is not functioning as it should and requires interdisciplinary effort to fix. Our camp attempts to tie these trends together to equip our innovative young scientists with the tools to solve healthcare problems in a rapidly evolving environment.”

The camp culminated with a hackathon. In this competition, student teams collaborated to pitch innovative solutions to healthcare issues.

“This is the entrepreneurial mindset we share throughout our activities,” Jupiter said. “It’s about problems and solutions, whether we build companies, products or communities.”

Participants included students from St. Mary’s University, Texas A&M International University, Texas A&M University San Antonio, Texas Southern University, University of Texas at Austin, University of Texas at Dallas, University of Texas at El Paso, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley and UTMB.

A grant from Blackstone LaunchPad funded the camp.