Rice to revolutionize lymphatic disease research and more news to know

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The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has awarded $18M to scientists at Rice. Photo courtesy Rice University.

Editor's note: We're looking back at the five biggest innovation headlines from the second half of February 2026, which include exciting Rice research advancements and Apple doubling down on production in Houston. Below are the five most-read InnovationMap stories from Feb. 16-28, 2026.

1. Rice University lands $18M to revolutionize lymphatic disease detection

Rice University scientists are pioneering two technologies to better diagnose and treat complex lymphatic anomalies. Photo via Getty Images.

An arm of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has awarded $18 million to scientists at Rice University for research that has the potential to revolutionize how lymphatic diseases are detected and help increase survivability. Continue reading.

2. Tech giant Apple doubles down on Houston with new production facility

Apple doubles down on Houston with new production facility, training centerPhoto courtesy Apple.

Tech giant Apple announced that it will double the size of its Houston manufacturing footprint as it brings production of its Mac mini to the U.S. for the first time. The company plans to begin production of its compact desktop computer at a new factory at Apple’s Houston manufacturing site later this year. The move is expected to create thousands of jobs in the Houston area, according to Apple. Continue reading.

3. Houston startup debuts new drone for first responders

Paladin Drones has revealed its next-gen emergency response drone, Knighthawk 2.0. Photo courtesy Paladin.

Houston-based Paladin Drones has debuted Knighthawk 2.0, its new autonomous, first-responder drone. The drone aims to strengthen emergency response and protect first responders, the company said in a news release. “We’re excited to launch Knighthawk 2.0 to help build safer cities and give any city across the world less than a 70-second response time for any emergency,” said Divyaditya Shrivastava, CEO of Paladin. Continue reading.

4. XSpace adds 3 Houston partners to fuel national expansion

XSpace, an innovative commercial real estate company, has partnered with three Houston firms to help grow its footprint. Rendering via xspacegroup.com

Texas-based XSpace Group has brought onboard three partners from the Houston area to ramp up the company’s national expansion. The new partners of XSpace, which sells high-end multi-use commercial condos, are KDW, Pyek Financial and Welcome Wilson Jr. Houston-based KDW is a design-build real estate developer, Katy-based Pyek offers fractional CFO services and Wilson is president and CEO of Welcome Group, a Houston real estate development firm. Continue reading.

5. Houston doctor wins NIH grant to test virtual reality for ICU delirium

Dr. Hina Faisal will test the effects of VR games on patients coming out the ICU, thanks to a recent NIH grant. Photo via Getty Images.

Think of it like a reverse version of The Matrix. A person wakes up in a hospital bed and gets plugged into a virtual reality game world in order to heal. While it may sound far-fetched, Dr. Hina Faisal, a Houston Methodist critical care specialist in the Department of Surgery, was recently awarded a $242,000 grant from the National Institute of Health to test the effects of VR games on patients coming out of major surgery in the intensive care unit (ICU). Continue reading.

Paladin Drones has revealed its next-gen emergency response drone, Knighthawk 2.0. Photo courtesy Paladin.

Houston startup debuts new drone for first responders

taking flight

Houston-based Paladin Drones has debuted Knighthawk 2.0, its new autonomous, first-responder drone.

The drone aims to strengthen emergency response and protect first responders, the company said in a news release.

“We’re excited to launch Knighthawk 2.0 to help build safer cities and give any city across the world less than a 70-second response time for any emergency,” said Divyaditya Shrivastava, CEO of Paladin.

The Knighthawk 2.0 is built on Paladin’s Drone as a First Responder (DFR) technology. It is equipped with an advanced thermal camera with long-range 5G/LTE connectivity that provides first responders with live, critical aerial awareness before crews reach the ground. The new drone is National Defense Authorization Act-compliant and integrates with Paladin's existing products, Watchtower and Paladin EXT.

Knighthawk 2.0 can log more than 40 minutes of flight time and is faster than its previous model, reaching a reported cruising speed of more than 70 kilometers per hour. It also features more advanced sensors, precision GPS and obstacle avoidance technology, which allows it to operate in a variety of terrains and emergency conditions.

Paladin also announced a partnership with Portuguese drone manufacturer Beyond Vision to integrate its Drone as a First Responder (DFR) technology with Beyond Vision’s NATO-compliant, fully autonomous unmanned aerial systems. Paladin has begun to deploy the Knighthawk 2.0 internationally, including in India and Portugal.

The company raised a $5.2 million seed round in 2024 and another round for an undisclosed amount earlier this year. In 2019, Houston’s Memorial Villages Police Department piloted Paladin’s technology.

According to the company, Paladin wants autonomous drones responding to every 911 call in the U.S. by 2027.

A concept design rendering of Persona AI's humanoid robot. The company is one of the finalists for the 2025 Houston Innovation Awards in the Deep Tech Business category. Rendering courtesy Persona AI.

6 Houston startups disrupting industries with innovative technology

meet the finalists

Houston is no stranger to technology that's shaping the future. As the longtime location of NASA Johnson Space Center to home base for new ventures disrupting industries with their technology, the Bayou City has had its finger on the pulse of what's new and next for decades.

The Deep Tech Business category in our 2025 Houston Innovation Awards will honor an innovative startup providing technology solutions based on substantial scientific or engineering challenges, including those in the AI, robotics and space sectors.

Six deep tech companies have been named finalists for the 2025 award. They range from a company developing predictive software to accelerate the energy transition to a new venture that's developing humanoid robots.

Read more about these businesses, their founders and their breakthrough technologies below. Then join us at the Houston Innovation Awards on Nov. 13 at Greentown Labs, when the winner will be unveiled.

Tickets are now on sale for this exclusive event celebrating Houston Innovation.

ARIX Technologies

Industrial and robotics company ARIX Technologies is an integrated robotics and data analytics company that delivers inspection services. Its ARIX VENUS robot combines aerospace-grade engineering, advanced non-destructive testing (NDT) and AI-powered analytics to detect hidden corrosion under insulation for the downstream energy, petrochemical, and chemical processing sectors.

ARIX was founded in 2017 by Dianna Liu, a former ExxonMobil engineer. Craig Mallory serves as CEO. The company reports that it is scaling deployments with major Gulf Coast refineries, expanding its analytics platform to include predictive corrosion modeling and growing a global partner program.

Little Place Labs

Space tech company Little Place Labs is developing an AI, machine-learning software across a network of satellites that can provide insights from space in under seven minutes.

The company was founded in 2022 by CEO Bosco Lai and CTO Gaurav Bajaj. The company recently received an award from the U.S. Space Force that will support it in deploying multiple applications and products onto more than 55 satellites over the next 36 months for both national security and commercial use cases. The company won the Security, GovTech & Space competition at the SXSW Pitch showcase last year.

Newfound Materials

Newfound Materials has developed a predictive synthesis software platform for accelerating the discovery of novel materials for critical energy applications, such as batteries, magnets, catalysts, and more. It guides users on the best experiments to try in the lab to optimize the synthesis of their materials.

Newfound Materials was founded in 2024 by CEO Matthew McDermott and participated in the inaugural Activate cohort. The company plans to release a public web app soon. It also has plans to raise a pre-seed or angel round.

Paladin Drones

Paladian develops drone-as-first-responder (DFR) systems for public safety. Its technology gives first responders live aerial video before teams arrive, enabling quicker decisions, better resource allocation and reduced false alarms.

The company was founded in 2018 by Divyaditya Shrivastava and participated in the Y Combinator accelerator that year. The company raised a $5.2 million seed round in 2024 and another round for an undisclosed amount earlier this year. In the future, it plans to expand its DFR deployments into more cities, offer new payload delivery capabilities (like delivering Narcan and life vests), and enhance deconfliction features.

Persona AI

Persona AI is building modularized humanoid robots that aim to deliver continuous, round-the-clock productivity and skilled labor for "dull, dirty, dangerous, and declining" jobs.

The company was founded by Houston entrepreneur Nicolaus Radford, who serves as CEO, along with CTO Jerry Pratt and COO Jide Akinyode. It raised eight figures in pre-seed funding this year and also expanded its operations at the Ion. The company is developing its prototype of a robot-welder for Hyundai's shipbuilding division, which it plans to unveil in 2026.

Tempest Droneworx

Tempest Droneworx provides real-time intelligence collected through drones, robots and sensors. Its Harbinger software platform shares data through a video game engine and aims to provide teams with early warning and insight to help them make decisions faster.

The company was founded in 2021 by CEO Ty Audronis and COO Dana Abramovitz. It participated in the Mass Challenge Air Force Labs and won the Best Speed Pitch at SXSW earlier this year. The company is currently raising a $2.5M seed round.

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Paladin Drones wants eyes in the skies within 30 seconds of an emergency call. Getty Images

Houston drone company creating the next generation of first responders

To the rescue

When 911 is called, first responders usually arrive at the scene around three or four minutes after the call's placed. But Houston-based Paladin Drones wants to have eyes on the ground ­— or eyes in the sky — within the first 30 seconds.

The company's mission is simple: to outfit public agencies and first-responders with drones that can be autonomously deployed to the site of an emergency. Equipped with thermal sensors and flying around 200 feet high, the drones can give police and firefighters near-instantaneous information on a situation underway.

At the beginning of April, Paladin Drones began working with the Memorial Villages Police Department to respond to incidents in Memorial Villages, Hunter's Creek, Piney Point Village, and Bunker Hill.

"(This is) one of the first departments in the country to be testing this technology," says Paladin Drones co-founder Divyaditya Shrivastava. "We're very limited in the area that we cover, and that's just because we're taking baby steps and going as carefully and deliberately as possible."

Paladin Drones was co-founded by Shrivastava and Trevor Pennypacker. In 2018, the company went through a three-month boot camp at Y Combinator, a California-based incubator that's churned out Dropbox, AirBNB, Instacart and more. Through Y Combinator, Paladin Drones was connected with venture capital investors in Houston.

The company's drones capture critical information, such as a vehicle's color and body type, a suspect's clothing, or the direction a suspect fled the scene. And since roughly 70 percent of 911 calls involve witnesses or passerby giving inaccurate information about the emergency's location, these drones will be able to pinpoint the exact location of an emergency, further aiding the arrival of first responders.

"We're working on tracking technology to give the drones the capability to auto-follow (suspects)," Shrivastava says.

Paladin Drones is looking to hire a handful of employees in the coming months, Shrivastava says. He declined to disclose any information on the company's funding plans, but said it's still involved with Y Combinator in California.

Shrivastava began developing Paladin Drones when he was finishing high school in Ohio. The summer before his senior year, a friend's house burned down. While nobody was injured in the fire, the home was destroyed, and Shrivastava spoke with the local firefighters. Tragically, the 911 call that alerted firefighters of the emergency was one of the 70 percent of calls that involved inaccurate location information.

"If they'd known the exact location, the house would've been saved," Shrivastava says. "A fire doubles every 30 seconds."

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Houston space co. adds local colleges to university alliance

space schools

Houston’s Axiom Space has added 26 new members to its University Alliance—including two from Houston—to support the next generation of space exploration.

Engineers, researchers and students from the partnering universities will be dedicated to advancing microgravity research, technology development and commercial innovation in low-Earth orbit.

Rice University and the University of Houston are among the new colleges to join the alliance, which launched with 15 members last year. The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Texas at El Paso have also joined, in addition to international institutions in Europe, Asia and Australia, and others from around the U.S. See full list here.

“Through the University Alliance, Axiom Space is uniting the international research community driven to enable human progress,” Lucie Low, Axiom Space chief science officer, said in a news release. “Together, alliance members are taking the initiative to ensure microgravity research benefits everyone on Earth and our shared goals fulfill a scientific purpose to advance civilization.”

Axiom is building the world’s first commercial space station, known as Axiom Station. The University Alliance “will support and advance space science during the transition from government-led to commercially owned and operated space stations,” the company said in a release. Partnering universities will contribute to the research community by participating in international collaborative scientific initiatives, identifying future research, and bolstering strategic positions in the commercial orbit research field.

Recently, the Rice Space Institute was also selected to lead the U.S. Space Force Strategic Institute 4 in addition to other space-centric partnerships.

“We’re excited to bring our expertise to this global alliance and to benefit from the deep expertise of our partners,” David Alexander, professor of physics and astronomy and director of the Rice Space Institute, said in a news release. “Space is truly a collaborative and global endeavor. Alliances like these are key to progress.”

UH and NASA’s Johnson Space Center expanded their collaboration in 2022. In 2024, UH launched its NASA MIRO Inflatable Deployable Environments and Adaptive Space Systems Center (IDEAS2) via a five-year, $5 million grant.

“As a major public research university located in Space City, the University of Houston has a unique opportunity and responsibility to help lead the future of space innovation, and our participation in Axiom Space’s University Alliance represents a major step forward in that mission,” Karolos Grigoriadis, the Hugh Roy and Lillie Cranz Cullen Endowed Professor and chair of mechanical and aerospace engineering at UH, added in a separate release.

Meanwhile, Axiom recently tacked on an additional $175 million to a previously announced capital raise, bringing the oversubscribed round to a total of more than $525 million. It also has announced plans to launch Swiss and Japanese subsidiaries.

This Houston suburb named one of 10 newest boomtowns in U.S.

Booming 'Burb

What do you get when you combine a city's surge in population, housing growth, and economy? For the Houston suburb of Conroe, it adds up to being America's No. 9 newest boomtown, according to a new survey from SmartAsset.

The personal finance website's just-released report analyzed more than 400 U.S. cities with populations of 65,000 or more to identify places experiencing rapid growth based on five-year changes in economic output, housing units, and labor force size.

Texas is home to the second-highest concentration of new boomtowns in America with 18 out of 75 located in the Lone Star State. Only Florida ranks higher than Texas by just one.

However, Texas nearly locked out the top five most bustling boomtowns in America. Austin suburb Georgetown topped the list, and its Central Texas neighbors New Braunfels (No. 2) and Leander (No. 4) ranked close behind. Dallas-Fort Worth mid-city Lewisville claimed the No. 5 spot. Lehi, Utah ranked in third place.

Conroe has soared in popularity as one of America's most sought-after suburbs over the last several years, boosted by its renter-friendliness and its livability among the millennial generation.

Conroe has seen a 37 percent increase in housing units from 2019 to 2024, with its labor force growing by 33 percent during that time. SmartAsset also determined that Montgomery County's economic output grew at compound annual rates of 4.9 percent.

The report says population booms and "expanding business activity" can create "visible momentum" for an up-and-coming city, but these fast changes can alter a city in ways residents may not expect.

"In recent years, some American cities stand out for attracting people, investment and development at a pace that sets them apart," the report said. "Boomtown status does not mean growth benefits everyone equally, but it does reflect a city’s expanding economic capacity and the new opportunities that come with it."

America's top 10 new boomtowns are:

  • No. 1 – Georgetown
  • No. 2 – New Braunfels
  • No. 3 – Lehi, Utah
  • No. 4 – Leander
  • No. 5 – Lewisville
  • No. 6 – Palm Coast, Florida
  • No. 7 – Nampa, Idaho
  • No. 8 – McKinney
  • No. 9 – Conroe
  • No. 10 – Frisco
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This article originally appeared on CultureMap.com.

5 must-read Houston innovation headlines: AI for seniors, major Meta news

Trending News

Editor's note: The first half of June brought big innovation headlines for Houston, from AI exploration to major Meta investments and the 2026 Fortune 500 list. Below are the five most-read InnovationMap stories published June 1-14, 2026:

1. Houston lab explores how AI bots can help the elderly

The University of Houston’s Empathetic Lifespan AI & Robotics for Aging (ELARA) Lab is currently conducting research into how AI bots may be able to help the elderly live more social and independent lives through several ongoing initiatives. The lab officially launched last month as part of the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture & Design under the leadership of Assistant Professor Chorong Park. Part of the lab’s mission is tackling ongoing problems with aging, such as dealing with disabilities and social isolation. Researchers’ current work is focused on designing a new AI companion bot specifically tailored to the needs of older people. Continue reading.

2. New UH survey reveals concerns over AI data center growth in Houston

A new report out of the University of Houston shows that area residents remain wary of the long-term effects of operating data centers. The recent survey from the University of Houston’s latest SPACE City Panel, conducted by the Center for Public Policy at the Hobby School of Public Affairs, shows that while 85 percent of Houston-area residents use AI, nearly 63 percent oppose the construction of AI data centers within 1 mile of their homes. Continue reading.

3. Meta to bring $115 million AI data center training initiative to Houston

Meta and Associated Builders and Contractors have entered into a partnership to invest $115 million in training programs for the construction of AI data centers, with a portion of the project launching in Houston. The companies announced June 8 that they would open America’s Workforce Academies at ABC chapter training centers in Houston; Indianapolis; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; and Columbus, Ohio. Continue reading.

4. 27 Houston companies make Fortune 500 for 2026, led by energy giants

Houston is a giant among U.S. hubs for corporate headquarters. The 2026 Fortune 500 lists 27 companies based in the Houston area, with many energy companies claiming top spots. Houston ties with Chicago for the second-most Fortune 500 headquarters, preceded only by New York City (53). Dallas-Fort Worth is home to 23 Fortune 500 headquarters. Texas leads the nation for Fortune 500 headquarters (57), with California in the No. 2 spot and New York at No. 3. Continue reading.

5. 7 Houston neighbors named to U.S. News' best places to live in 2026

Several Houston suburbs have been crowned the best places to live in the U.S. for 2026, according to U.S. News & World Report. Sugar Land is the highest-ranked city in the Houston metro, and it ranks as the 10th best place to live in the country. Continue reading.

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