Most of Houston's smartest ZIP codes surround the Texas Medical Center. Photo by Dwight C. Andrews/Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau

The Houston area is bursting with brain power. Three ZIP codes in the region are home to the biggest share of Texans who've earned a master's, professional, or doctoral degree, according to a new list from UnitedStatesZipCodes.org. And that, according to one economic development executive, is a boon to Houston's workforce.

Houston's 77030 ZIP code, which houses the Texas Medical Center, sits atop the new ranking. There, more than half (51.7 percent) of adults 25 and over, or about 3,800 people, hold a postgraduate or professional degree. As a whole, 12 percent of adults in the Houston metro area have a postgraduate or professional degree, according to the Greater Houston Partnership.

The postgraduate category includes PhDs and MBAs, while the professional category includes JDs (law degrees) and MDs (medical degrees).

"When deciding where to live, neighborhoods full of residents with postgraduate degrees are … increasingly attractive," reads UnitedStatesZipCodes.org, which based its ranking on U.S. Census Bureau data. "Well-educated communities — full of leaders in technology, medicine, business, and more — can bring new industries and revenue."

Ranking second on the list of brainiest Texas ZIP codes is Houston's 77005, where 48.5 percent of adults (or about 8,600 people) hold a postgraduate or professional degree. This ZIP code, which neighbors the 77030 ZIP code, includes the Rice campus. Also, it's presumably home to a lot of highly educated Rice professors and Texas Medical Center doctors.

Directly to the west of the 77030 ZIP is Bellaire — 77401 — which appears at No. 3 in the ranking. In the 77401 ZIP code, 47.6 percent of adults (or nearly 6,300 people) have earned a postgraduate or professional degree; it, too, is likely packed with Rice University professors and Texas Medical Center doctors.

Susan Davenport, senior vice president of economic development at the Greater Houston Partnership, says the region's two top-tier schools — Rice and the University of Houston — along with the region's more than 40 other four-year and two-year schools contribute to Houston's collective brain trust. So do two nearby schools: the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M University in College Station.

"More broadly, we are an attractive market for educated professionals from across the country, especially compared to leading East or West Coast cities, because of our lower cost of living, affordable housing prices, and strong economy," Davenport says.

"This creates a virtuous cycle: Companies move to or expand in Houston because they want access to this talent," she adds, "and leading talent moves here because they want to work for these companies and institution."

Davenport says initiatives like the Innovation Corridor, the TMC3 research campus and The Ion entrepreneurship hub also help nurture a well-educated workforce.

"We anticipate these projects will attract even more of the world's brightest minds to our region," she says.

Three other Houston ZIP codes made the top 10 in Texas:

  • No. 5 — 77098 (39.2 percent). That percentage represents about 4,300 people. This ZIP code is just northwest of the Rice and Texas Medical Center campuses.
  • No. 6 — 77025 (39.15 percent). That percentage represents almost 8,200 people. This ZIP code is just southwest of the Rice and Texas Medical Center campuses.
  • No. 10 — 77024 (35.4 percent). That percentage represents about 9,400 people. This ZIP code is slightly east of the Energy Corridor.

"It is no surprise that top-flight, innovation-focused talent would flock to neighborhoods near downtown, Uptown and the world-renowned Texas Medical Center," Davenport says.

Other Texas ZIP codes in the top 10 for postgraduate or professional degrees are:

  • No. 4 — 78703, Austin (41.5 percent). This ZIP code, less than two miles west of the University of Texas campus, includes high-end neighborhoods such as Tarrytown and Old West Austin.
  • No. 7 — 75205, Dallas (37.7 percent). The Southern Methodist University campus sits on the east side of this ZIP code.
  • No. 8 — 78746, Austin (37.2 percent). This ZIP code encompasses parts of West Austin, as well as the wealthy suburbs of Rollingwood and West Lake Hills.
  • No. 9 — 78731, Austin (37.1 percent). This ZIP code incorporates part of Central Austin and a large swath of Northwest Austin.

Federal data shows the unemployment rates for people with master's, professional, and doctoral degrees are lower than for other groups, such as people whose bachelor's or associate's degrees are their most advanced degrees. In addition, people with a postgraduate or professional degree typically earn more money.

"Graduates with the right knowledge and skills have the ability to demand higher salaries, as they are equipped to make significant contributions to the revenue and growth of the companies they work for," the Digital Marketing Institute says.
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Rice University team develops eco-friendly method to destroy 'forever chemicals' in water

clean water research

Rice University researchers have teamed up with South Korean scientists to develop the first eco-friendly technology that captures and destroys toxic “forever chemicals,” or PFAS, in water.

PFAS have been linked to immune system disruption, certain cancers, liver damage and reproductive disorders. They can be found in water, soil and air, as well as in products like Teflon pans, waterproof clothing and food packaging. They do not degrade easily and are difficult to remove.

Thus far, PFAS cleanup methods have relied on adsorption, in which molecules cling to materials like activated carbon or ion-exchange resins. But these methods tend to have limited capacity, low efficiency, slow performance and can create additional waste.

The Rice-led study, published in the journal Advanced Materials, centered on a layered double hydroxide (LDH) material made from copper and aluminum that could rapidly capture PFAS and be used to destroy the chemicals.

The study was led by Rice professor Youngkun Chung, a postdoctoral fellow under the mentorship of Michael S. Wong. It was conducted in collaboration with Seoktae Kang, professor at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, and Keon-Ham Kim, professor at Pukyung National University, who first discovered the LDH material.

The team evaluated the LDH material in river water, tap water and wastewater. And, according to Rice, that material’s unique copper-aluminum layers and charge imbalances created an ideal binding environment to capture PFAS molecules.

“To my astonishment, this LDH compound captured PFAS more than 1,000 times better than other materials,” Chung, lead author of the study and now a fellow at Rice’s WaTER (Water Technologies, Entrepreneurship and Research) Institute and Sustainability Institute, said in a news release. “It also worked incredibly fast, removing large amounts of PFAS within minutes, about 100 times faster than commercial carbon filters.”

Next, Chung, along with Rice professors Pedro Alvarez and James Tour, worked to develop an eco-friendly, sustainable method of thermally decomposing the PFAS captured on the LDH material. They heated saturated material with calcium carbonate, which eliminated more than half of the trapped PFAS without releasing toxic by-products.

The team believes the study’s results could potentially have large-scale applications in industrial cleanups and municipal water treatments.

“We are excited by the potential of this one-of-a-kind LDH-based technology to transform how PFAS-contaminated water sources are treated in the near future,” Wong added in the news release. “It’s the result of an extraordinary international collaboration and the creativity of young researchers.”

Axiom Space announces new CEO amid strategic leadership change

new leader

Six months after promoting Tejpaul Bhatia from chief revenue officer to CEO, commercial space infrastructure and human spaceflight services provider Axiom Space has replaced him.

On Oct. 15, Houston-based Axiom announced Jonathan Cirtain has succeeded Bhatia as CEO. Bhatia joined Axiom in 2021. Cirtain remains the company’s president, a role he assumed in June, according to his LinkedIn profile.

In a news release, Axiom said Cirtain’s appointment as CEO is a “strategic leadership change” aimed at advancing the company’s development of space infrastructure.

Axiom hired Cirtain as president in June, according to his LinkedIn profile. The company didn’t publicly announce that move.

Kam Ghaffarian, co-founder and executive chairman of Axiom, said Cirtain’s “proven track record of leadership and commitment to excellence align perfectly with our mission of building era-defining space infrastructure that will drive exploration and fuel the global space economy.”

Aside from praising Cirtain, Ghaffarian expressed his “sincere gratitude” for Bhatia’s work at Axiom, including his leadership as CEO during “a significant transition period.”

Bhatia was promoted to CEO in April after helping Axiom gain more than $1 billion in contracts, Space News reported. He succeeded Ghaffarian as CEO. Axiom didn’t indicate whether Bhatia quit or was terminated.

Cirtain, an astrophysicist, was a senior executive at BWX Technologies, a supplier of nuclear components and fuel, for eight years before joining Axiom. Earlier, Cirtain spent nearly nine years in various roles at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. He previously co-founded a machine learning company specializing in Earth observation.

“Axiom Space is pioneering the commercialization of low-Earth orbit infrastructure while accelerating advancements in human spaceflight technologies,” Cirtain said. “I look forward to continuing our team’s important work of driving innovation to support expanded access to space and off-planet capabilities that will underpin the future of space exploration.”

Among other projects, Axiom is developing the world’s first commercial space station, creating next-generation spacesuits for astronauts and sending astronauts on low-Earth orbit missions.

Houston billionaire benefactors will donate almost entire fortune to charity

Giving Back

Houston billionaires Rich and Nancy Kinder plan to donate an astounding 95% of their multi-billion-dollar wealth to charities, they told ABC13's Melanie Lawson.

The news comes as the Kinder Foundation announced an $18.5 million expansion project for Emancipation Park in the heart of Third Ward. That historic park was founded by slaves in 1872.

The Kinders are one of the wealthiest couples in the nation, worth $11.4 billion, according to Forbes. You've certainly seen the Kinder name on buildings and facilities around the city of Houston.

The Kinders are also among the most generous, giving away hundreds of millions to Houston institutions and charities. Their plan is to give away almost all of their wealth, or more than $10 billion.

Rich Kinder helped build oil and gas pipeline giant Kinder Morgan, but he stepped down as CEO more than a decade ago for a what he calls a bigger cause.

"Well, I think we'd all like to leave the world a little better place than we found it," he said. "And we just felt early on that the right thing to do was to try to give most or all of that away. So that's what we plan to do during our lifetime and after our death."

They found kindred spirits as one of the first couples to sign The Giving Pledge, established by billionaires Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett.

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Continue reading the full story, with video, on ABC13.com.