Houston research team invents cost-saving innovation for automated drug dosing

groundbreaking tech

Rice University synthetic biologists created a device to demonstrate a new method that could slash the costs of creating wearable monitors for precision, automated drug dosing of chemotherapies and other drugs. Photo by Jeff Fitlow/Rice University

A team of Rice University researchers has built a technology that uses a $20 blood-glucose sensor to potentially automate dosing of practically any drug.

In a paper recently published in Nature, researchers in Caroline Ajo-Franklin’s lab shared that they were able to modify the inexpensive piece of equipment to detect afimoxifene, an estrogen inhibitor that is naturally produced by a patient’s body after taking the chemotherapy drug tamoxifen.

“The dream is to have technology similar to what’s available today for monitoring and treating variations in blood glucose, and have that be true for basically any drug,” said Ajo-Franklin, a bioscientist, cancer researcher and director of the Rice Synthetic Biology Institute in a press release from Rice University. “Millions of people use blood-glucose monitors every day. If we can use that same basic technology to monitor other drugs and biomarkers, we could move away from the one-size-fits-all dosing regimes that we’re stuck with today.”

The lead author of the study was postdoctoral research associate Rong Cai. She and the team tested more than 400 modified versions of the electron-releasing proteins (what creates the current that glucose monitors detect) until they found a version that reacted with afimoxifene. Essentially, they built an afimoxifene sensor that could reliably detect the presence of the drug.

According to Ajo-Franklin, her team is currently at work testing ways to identify drugs other than afimoxifene.

In a press release, Cai said, “The glucometer is the part that’s so well-developed. While our target is different, it’s just a matter of engineering and changing the protein on the inside. On the outside, everything will still be the same. You can still do the test with a strip or on your arm.”

Better still, she went on to say that because the signal is electrical, it can be sent to a phone or computer to be read and stored.

“That’s the part, that marriage between electricity and biology, that is very attractive,” Cai said.

Rice University synthetic biologists (from right to left) Caroline Ajo-Franklin, Chiagoziem Ngwadom and Rong Cai worked with Rice engineer Rafael Verduzco (left) to create and demonstrate a method of universalizing blood-glucose detection technology as a way of rapidly and inexpensively creating sensors that can monitor the dosing of chemotherapies and other drugs in real time. Photo by Jeff Fitlow/Rice University

This week's roundup of Houston innovators includes Tatiana Fofanova of Koda Health, Rafael Verduzco of Rice University, and Sujata “Su” Bajaj and Dakisha Allen of Yuvo Health. Photos courtesy

4 Houston innovators to know this week

who's who

Editor's note: In this week's roundup of Houston innovators to know, I'm introducing you to four local innovators across industries — from digital health to research — recently making headlines in Houston innovation.

Tatiana Fofanova, co-founder and CEO of Koda Health

Tatiana Fofanova, co-founder and CEO of Koda, joined the Houston Innovators Podcast to discuss her company's growth. Image via LinkedIn

It's Tatiana Fofanova's goal to have Koda Health's platform — a B2B Enterprise SaaS solution that guides patients through the process of proactive healthcare planning and document authentication — active in all 50 states by the end of the first quarter of 2023. She's already halfway there.

The tech platform allows for patients and their providers to get on the same page for their care. Fofanova describes the platform as similar to TurboTax — users answer a series of questions and the program provides a care plan then shared with the patient's doctors. This greatly simplifies — and democratizes — the process for patients and providers both.

"The standard of care for advanced care planning has traditionally been left to patients to do on their own — with estate planning attorney or through a direct-to-consumer solution," Fofanova says on this week's episode of the Houston Innovators Podcast. Read more.

Rafael Verduzco, associate chair and a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and of materials science and nanoengineering at Rice University

Rafael Verduzco is leading the research and development. Photo by Jeff Fitlow/Rice University

A team of researchers from Rice University have received a $2 million grant to develop a unique technology that speeds up the analysis of wastewater for viruses from hours to seconds. The team is based out of Rice’s George R. Brown School of Engineering and led by Rafael Verduzco, associate chair and a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and of materials science and nanoengineering. The four-year grant from the National Science Foundation will support the development of the technology, which includes wastewater-testing bioelectric sensors that deliver immediate notice of presence of viruses like SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, according to a news release from Rice.

“Monitoring wastewater for COVID has been pretty effective as a way to get an idea of where we are as a population,” says Verduzco in the release. “But the way it’s done is you have to sample it, you have to do a PCR test and there’s a delay. Our selling point was to get real-time, continuous monitoring to see just how much of this virus is in the wastewater.” Read more.

Sujata “Su” Bajaj as CTO and Dakisha Allen as head of product of Yuvo Health

Two Houstonians have been named to the executive board of a New York startup. Photos courtesy of Yuvo Health

ANew York City-based, tech-enabled health administrative and managed care solution has announced the latest addition to its C-suite — including two executives based in Houston.

Yuvo Health, which provides community health centers a tech platform for managing care, announced the appointment of Sujata “Su” Bajaj as CTO and Dakisha Allen as head of product. Additionally, the startup named New York-based Anthony Thompson as head of development and Ishaan Jalan as chief of staff.

“It is with tremendous pride and excitement that we announce the growth of our leadership team, especially as it is less than six months since our last corporate expansion,” says Cesar Herrera, CEO and co-founder of Yuvo Health. Read more.

A team out of the engineering school at Rice University has created a technology for real-time wastewater monitoring. Photo via rice.edu

Houston research team snags $2M grant for virus sensing tech

money moves

A team of researchers from Rice University have received a $2 million grant to develop a unique technology that speeds up the analysis of wastewater for viruses from hours to seconds.

The team is based out of Rice’s George R. Brown School of Engineering and led by Rafael Verduzco, associate chair and a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and of materials science and nanoengineering. The four-year grant from the National Science Foundation will support the development of the technology, which includes wastewater-testing bioelectric sensors that deliver immediate notice of presence of viruses like SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, according to a news release from Rice.

The research project — with its partners at the Houston Health Department — have already developed water testing procedures and have analyzed samples from locations around the city. The current process includes taking samples and transferring them to Rice for analysis, but the new technology would be able to monitor systems onsite and instantly. The parties involved with this work are also collaborating with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Center of Excellence for wastewater epidemiology that was announced in August.

“Monitoring wastewater for COVID has been pretty effective as a way to get an idea of where we are as a population,” says Verduzco in the release. “But the way it’s done is you have to sample it, you have to do a PCR test and there’s a delay. Our selling point was to get real-time, continuous monitoring to see just how much of this virus is in the wastewater.”

The grant's co-principal investigators include Jonathan Silberg, the Stewart Memorial Professor of BioSciences and director of the Systems, Synthetic and Physical Biology Ph.D. program, and Caroline Ajo-Franklin, a professor of biosciences. Co-investigators also include Lauren Stadler, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, and Kirstin Matthews, a fellow at the Baker Institute for Public Policy.

“These are engineered microbes we’re putting into wastewater, and even though they’re encapsulated, we want to know if there are concerns from health authorities and the general population,” Verduzco said. “Kirstin’s role is to look at the policy side, and also gauge public reaction and educate people about what it means when we talk about engineered bacteria.”

Rafael Verduzco is leading the research and development. Photo by Jeff Fitlow/Rice University

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Houston VC funding surged nearly 50% in Q1 2026, report says

VC victories

First-quarter venture capital funding for Houston-area startups climbed nearly 50 percent compared to the same time last year, according to the PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor.

In Q1 2026, Houston-area startups raised $532.3 million, a 49 percent jump from $320.2 million in Q1 2025, according to the PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor.

However, the Q1 total fell 23 percent from the $671.05 million raised in Q4 2025.

Among the first-quarter funding highlights in Houston were:

  • Utility Global, which focuses on industrial decarbonization, announced a first close of $100 million for its Series D round.
  • Sage Geosystems raised a $97 million Series B round to support its geothermal energy storage technology.

Those funding rounds underscore Houston’s evolution as a magnet for VC in the energy sector.

“Today, the energy sector is increasingly extending into the startup economy as venture capital flows into companies developing the technologies that will shape the future of global energy,” the Greater Houston Partnership says.

The energy industry accounted for nearly 40 percent of Houston-area VC funding last year, according to market research and lead generation service Growth List.

Adding to Houston’s stature in VC for energy startups are investors like Chevron Technology Ventures, the investment arm of Houston-based oil and gas giant Chevron; Goose Capital; Mercury Fund; and Quantum Energy Partners.

How Houston innovators played a role in the historic Artemis II splashdown

safe landing

Research from Rice University played a critical role in the safe return of U.S. astronauts aboard NASA’s Artemis II mission this month.

Rice mechanical engineer Tayfun E. Tezduyar and longtime collaborator Kenji Takizawa developed a key computational parachute fluid-structure interaction (FSI) analysis system that proved vital in NASA’s Orion capsule’s descent into the Pacific Ocean. The FSI system, originally developed in 2013 alongside NASA Johnson Space Center, was critical in Orion’s three-parachute design, which slowed the capsule as it returned to Earth, according to Rice.

The model helped ensure that the parachute design was large enough to slow the capsule for a safe landing while also being stable enough to prevent the capsule from oscillating as it descended.

“You cannot separate the aerodynamics from the structural dynamics,” Tezduyar said in a news release. “They influence each other continuously and even more so for large spacecraft parachutes, so the analysis must capture that interaction in a robustly coupled way.”

The end result was a final parachute system, refined through NASA drop tests and Rice’s computational FSI analysis, that eliminated fluctuations and produced a stable descent profile.

Apart from the dynamic challenges in design, modeling Orion’s parachutes also required solving complex equations that considered airflow and fabric deformation and accounted for features like ringsail canopy construction and aerodynamic interactions among multiple parachutes in a cluster.

“Essentially, my entire group was dedicated to that work, because I considered it a national priority,” Tezduyar added in the release. “Kenji and I were personally involved in every computer simulation. Some of the best graduate students and research associates I met in my career worked on the project, creating unique, first-of-its-kind parachute computer simulations, one after the other.”

Current Intuitive Machines engineer Mario Romero also worked on Orion during his time at NASA. From 2018 to 2021, Romero was a member of the Orion Crew Capsule Recovery Team, which focused on creating likely scenarios that crewmembers could encounter in Orion.

The team trained in NASA’s 6.2-million-gallon pool, using wave machines to replicate a range of sea conditions. They also simulated worst-case scenarios by cutting the lights, blasting high-powered fans and tipping a mock capsule to mimic distress situations. In some drills, mock crew members were treated as “injured,” requiring the team to practice safe, controlled egress procedures.

“It’s hard to find the appropriate descriptors that can fully encapsulate the feeling of getting to witness all the work we, and everyone else, did being put into action,” Romero tells InnovationMap. “I loved seeing the reactions of everyone, but especially of the Houston communities—that brought me a real sense of gratitude and joy.”

Intuitive Machines was also selected to support the Artemis II mission using its Space Data Network and ground station infrastructure. The company monitored radio signals sent from the Orion spacecraft and used Doppler measurements to help determine the spacecraft's precise position and speed.

Tim Crain, Chief Technology Officer at Intuitive Machines, wrote about the experience last week.

"I specialized in orbital mechanics and deep space navigation in graduate school,” Crain shared. “But seeing the theory behind tracking spacecraft come to life as they thread through planetary gravity fields on ultra-precise trajectories still seems like magic."

Rice Alliance names first head of platform & more innovation headlines

Trending News

Editor's note: The top April innovation headlines to know include Rice Alliance's newly minted head of platform and FDA approval for a local medtech startup. Below are the five most-read InnovationMap stories from April 1-15, 2026:

1. Rice Alliance names Houston healthtech exec as first head of platform

The Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship has named its first head of platform. Houston entrepreneur Laura Neder stepped into the newly created role last month, according to an email from Rice Alliance. Neder will focus on building and growing Houston’s Venture Advantage Platform. The emerging platform, which is being promoted by Rice Alliance and the Ion, aims to connect founders with the "people, capital and expertise they need to scale." Continue reading.

2. Houston medtech startup clears FDA approval for new surgical tool

Prana Surgical has developed a minimally invasive, image-guided, single-use tissue extraction tool. Photo via LinkedIn

Houston-based Prana Surgical will soon bring a new electrosurgical tool to operating rooms around the country. The Prana System officially cleared U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval earlier this month. Prana Surgical began as Prana Thoracic in 2022. Back then, the company primarily focused on developing screening tools for lung cancer diagnosis. It raised $6 million in series A funding rounds in 2023 and 2024 before transitioning to broader surgical needs in 2025. Continue reading.

3. Houston leads U.S. in population growth for 2025, Census says

The 10-county Houston metro added 126,720 residents from July 1, 2024, to July 1, 2025. Photo via Getty Images

Imagine that the Houston metro area swallowed a city the size of Pearland in just one year. That’s essentially what happened from 2024 to 2025, with the Houston metro ranking first in the U.S. for population growth based on the number of people. New estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau show the 10-county Houston metro added 126,720 residents from July 1, 2024, to July 1, 2025. That’s just shy of Pearland’s roughly 133,000-resident tally. Continue reading.

4. 8+ can't-miss Houston business and innovation events in April


From the Rice Business Plan Competition to the Veterans Business Battle, here's what not to miss in April and how to register. Photo courtesy the Ion

Houston's weeklong innovation festival kicked off April, followed by Rice University's globally recognized pitch competition returning for its 26th year. Plus, find coworking pop-ups, industry meetups, pitch battles and even a crawfish boil on the calendar. Continue reading.

5. Houston unicorn closes $421M to fuel first phase of flagship energy project

Tim Latimer, CEO and co-founder of Fervo Energy. Photo courtesy of Fervo Energy

Houston geothermal unicorn Fervo Energy has closed $421 million in non-recourse debt financing for the first phase of its flagship Cape Station project in Beaver County, Utah. Fervo believes Cape Station can meet the needs of surging power demand from data centers, domestic manufacturing and an energy market aiming to use clean and reliable power. According to the company, Cape Station will begin delivering its first power to the grid this year and is expected to reach approximately 100 megwatts of operating capacity by early 2027. Fervo added that it plans to scale to 500 megawatts. Continue reading.

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