INNOVATION - Agensi Inovasi Malaysia all out to commercialise good ideas - MALAYISIA

 

By WONG LI ZA
star2@thestar.com.my

Promising: Serotech CEO Sharifah Nur Rahimah Syed Alias with Assoc Prof Dr Ahmed Mahir Mokhtar Mohamed Bakri at a contract farmer’s farm in Selangor. The CiliBangi project has generated good response from investors.

 

Innovation Business Opportunities, an initiative by Agensi Inovasi Malaysia, is all out to commercialise good ideas to generate new wealth.
A GOOD idea remains just that – a mere idea – if it does not take shape.

Throughout history, thousands of brilliant inventions worldwide have gone unnoticed due to lack of buy-in from relevant parties and financial support.

However, these creations could potentially have generated much income or benefited society, or in short, been transformed from being an invention to an innovation.

Bridging the gap between invention and commerce is an initiative facilitated by Agensi Inovasi Malaysia (AIM) called Innovation Business Opportunities (IBO).

AIM is a statutory body set up by the Government via the AIM Act 2010 with the primary purpose of being the driving force behind Malaysia’s push towards establishing an “innovation economy” and the country’s aspiration of achieving high-income nation status.

Launched in April this year, IBO offers intellectual properties owned by universities, and public research and development organisations in Malaysia, to the private sector for them to be taken up and commercialised.

“Innovation Business Opportunities is one of the initiatives undertaken by AIM to ensure ideas are taken through from creation to commercialisation,” said Faizal Hasan, assistant vice-president (IBO) with AIM.

“Under IBO, innovations from public universities and research institutes are documented, analysed and offered to the rakyat for bidding. The idea is to provide these government-funded innovations as opportunities for the rakyat to create new wealth,” he said.

What a harvest! Cilibangi, a top quality chilli, being dried at Rumah Tumbuhan, UKM.
 

He added that in tandem with the positive feedback received, AIM has widened the scope of the innovations to include those from the private sector.

Phase Two of the IBO was launched recently by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, who also announced the progress from Phase One.

Of the 42 IBOs offered in Phase One, 33 had the potential to generate revenue totalling RM1.58bil over three years, 15 had been taken up by industry partners for commercialisation, while 18 others were in different stages of negotiations.

These 18 projects have the potential of adding another RM748mil to the nation’s Gross National Income (GNI), while the total revenue potential for the 15 projects is estimated at RM832mil.

Under Phase Two, 50 new technologies and products, which are open for transparent and competitive bidding, have the potential of generating RM560mil after three years of operation.

When this article went to print, at least nine projects had received bidders.
They include, with projected third year revenue in parentheses, the LesTani: Biofungicide for Control of BSR Disease of Oil Palm (RM45.6mil); Production of Bioethanol from Palm Oil Waste (RM17.72mil); MyCOACH Software for Sports Motion Coaching System that analyses human motion on video without using any additional physical marker or special tight fitting clothing (RM360,000); Commercial Sweetener, a project that aims to produce Sorbitol, a natural sweetener used in health foods and sugar-free products, from sawdust (RM6.4mil); the AquaTCS fish tank filter (RM2.7mil); and the Sundait Board Game, a Borneo-based educational and entertaining board game that incorporates Kadazan-Dusun riddles (RM290,400).

Another two projects with high potential revenue are the Wengtonia: Detoxificant for Drug Addiction, a health supplement with antioxidant and anti-microbial properties for detoxification purposes (RM36.7mil), and Natural Colourant for Cosmetics, derived from orchid pigment (RM117mil).

Wengtonia’s main ingredient is derived from a local plant called daun putat (Barringtonia racemosa), traditionally consumed as a salad and found largely in rural areas.

Natural colourants in biomaterials are stabilised in the form of macrobeads through environmentfriendly biotechnological processes.
 

It took researchers Aweng Eh Rak and Dr Lee Seong Wei, senior lecturers at Universiti Malaysia Kelantan (UMK), three years to develop the supplement.

Wengtonia has powerful antioxidant properties which enhance the immune system and encourage anti-microbial activities against various species of pathogens.

“It is suitable for both new drug users and also hardcore addicts, but the latter may have to take higher dosages,” said Lee, adding that UMK has started planting the daun putat.

“Depending on the dosage applied, basically it will take a week before the detoxification effect shows. Theoretically, Wengtonia may also help patients on long-term medications reduce their dependency on their medication due to the high antioxidant content in the plant,” he said, adding that they hope to set up their own company and commercialise the product.

Wengtonia costs US$100 (RM310) for 500 pills.

Aiming to tap into the billion-dollar colour cosmetics market is the natural colourant IBO spearheaded by Prof Dr Lee Pat Moi, former researcher at the Faculty of Applied Sciences, Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM) Shah Alam.

Currently founder and CEO of PML ChemBioTech Sdn Bhd based at FRIM-MTDC Technology Centre in Kepong, Selangor, Prof Lee’s project plans to commercialise natural and functional floral colourants for food, cosmetics and pharmaceutical products.

“The purpose is to enable the general public to consume colourful, yet safe food products and use appealing and safe cosmetic products,” said Prof Lee.

The spectrum of colourants are violet, blue, green, yellow, orange and red, obtainable from a single species of orchid flowers such as dendrobium or cattleya, red hibiscus and clitoria ternatea. The red, blue and violet colourants possess antioxidant properties and other health benefits as well.

Daun putat (Barringtonia racemosa), the main ingredient in Wengtonia, a health supplement for detoxification purposes.

Prof Lee said that natural red colourants obtained from other natural resources are usually not stable when exposed to air, light and heat.

“We have stabilised our natural red colourants in biomaterials in the form of macro-beads. micro-beads and nano particles through mild and environment-friendly biotechnological processes.

“They are brightly coloured and the biomaterials used for stabilisation also have anti-microbial and antioxidant properties. In addition, they are biodegradable and safe to be consumed,” she emphasised, adding that the natural colourants are more stable than other natural colourants by two- to three-fold at temperatures of less than 45°C.

Prof Lee added that she and her team have also developed formulations for blue and violet lipsticks which contain blue and violet floral extracts respectively.

“When the blue lipstick is applied to lips, the colour changes from blue to red. Similarly, the colour of the lips changes from violet to red upon using the violet lipstick,” she said, adding that the lipsticks also have moisturising effect.

To date, the company has filed seven patents in Malaysia and the natural colourants have also won several international awards, including two Geneva Gold Medal Awards (Switzerland), the Eureka Special Gold Medal Award (Brussel) and Biotech Asia Gold Medal Award.

“Our plan is to further strengthen our research and development to produce natural product-based aesthetic healthcare and therapeutical bioproducts to add aesthetical value as well as contribute to the quality of life,” she shared.

One of the IBOs from Phase One which has generated good response from investors is the CiliBangi project, which has the potential to generate a revenue of RM44.5mil in three years.

CiliBangi is a top quality chilli that is virus-resistant, high yielding and easily harvested. The chilli was first cultivated by the late Professor K.M. Graham in Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia in 1978. The work was continued by Assoc Prof Dr Ahmed Mahir Mokhtar Mohamed Bakri in 1987.

After 15 generations, Cilibangi-1 and -2 varieties were developed and introduced in 1995. Cilibangi-3 and Cilibangi-4 were cultivated after 20 generations and launched in 1998.

In 2010, another new variety combining the previous traits of Cilibangi was developed and named Crunchious, a trademarked premium hybrid which has a longer life-span.

“Crunchious is the brand given to two varieties of Cilibangi which have two heat levels – hot and mild. This brand is positioned for the international market. An international company has shown interest in planting Cilibangi in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, and are negotiating on the licensing agreement which will be signed soon,” revealed Serotech Sdn Bhd CEO Sharifah Nur Rahimah Syed Alias.

Serotech is a subsidiary of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), set up through its commercial arm, UKM Technology Sdn Bhd. It is tasked to handle the production and distribution of Cilibangi to the market.

“Cilibangi’s synchronised flowering and fruiting makes it easy for farmers to plan large-scale staggered planting to produce a continuous supply of chilli throughout the year. This unique characteristic of Cilibangi has attracted investors,” explained Sharifah.

Since April 2012, over 10,000 seedlings have been sold to contract farmers, both directly and via outsourcing.

“We are evaluating a buy-back programme from them. At the moment, we are helping them find the market for the chillies. So far, it is going very well,” said Sharifah.

“Farmers have shown a lot of interest in planting Cilibangi. However, we have to ensure only quality farmers and entrepreneurs are selected to ensure the success of our Cilibangi Planting Programme,” she said.

Currently, the company’s target market for the fresh chillies is end-product industries like chilli sauce and sambal-related producers, which constitute the largest percentage (40%) of the Malaysian chilli market segment.

“We are planning to enter the hypermarkets once we’ve started our large-scale planting programme. Other than fresh chillies, we’re also planning to produce our own Cilibangi powder and paste.
“We’re confident of achieving our target revenue. We expect next year to be a very productive year with many big projects coming in,” added Sharifah.

■ For more info, visit innovation.my or cilibangi.com or facebook.com/Cilibangi

- Five quick tricks to revamp your look - UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

 

Wouldn’t it be great if we had a magic wand? Then, with a quick twinkle and flick of our wrist we could transform our drab, dull looks and become popping, vivid versions of ourselves. Since we don’t have one, we’ve instead decided to show you five quick tricks that will help you revamp your look in a flash.

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• To give yourself a quick and almost instant revamp you should change your brows. The right brows can frame your favourite features and change your appearance

 

Quick trick to revamp your look: Stand up Although we risk sounding like your mother, if you want to revamp your look stand up straight. Your posture is hugely important to the way you look. Even the world’s prettiest woman would look unattractive if she stooped and slouched through life. Not only will maintaining a good posture make you appear more confident you will also look slimmer. Patrice Winter, a spokeswoman for the American Physical Therapy Association, says that standing tall can make you look 5kgs slimmer. So ladies, shoulders back and stand tall.
Instructions: Having good posture doesn’t mean standing polka straight. You need to stand naturally, allowing your spine to curve in an S shape. Make sure when you are standing that your hips and ears are aligned. Also if you sit at a desk, make sure you use your legs to distribute your weight and help relieve some of the pressure off of your tailbone.

Quick trick to revamp your look: Dye When you think of having a makeover or revamping your look it can be easy to think you have to clear out the bank balance and take out a second mortgage on your home. Changing your look doesn’t have to be expensive though and it can be as cheap as you want it to be. If you feel like your wardrobe needs updating, take a look at what you already own. If you have a pair of trousers or skirt that fits well but is looking a little old, pop it into the washing machine and add in some fabric dye (see below for instructions). To create an entire outfit, you could also pop a few accessories into the washing machine too, such as a fabric brooch or fabric bag. Then you have an instantly colour coordinated outfit.
Instructions: Fabric dye is a simple way to revamp your wardrobe. Make sure you check the dye you use for instructions, but generally you will simply need to put in the dye from the box into your washing machine and add salt. Then turn on your machine and wash the clothes in a hot wash until the cycle is complete.

Quick trick to revamp your look: Eyes and lips Your eyes and lips are your chance to have fun and, if you want to give yourself a makeover using makeup, start with these areas. First, take a look at the colour of your eyes and try to find an eyeliner pen or pencil that matches your natural eye colour. Then play around with designs. You could add flicks to the corners of your eyes to make them appear bigger, or add dashes on your lower lash line. Have fun and find out what works for you. If you have bright eyes, choose a neutral lip shade and vice versa. For bright lips that pop why not try using two shades of lipstick to your lips. If you use a lighter shade around the outer edge of your lips your lips will appear plumper.
Instructions: When applying your eyeliner make sure you keep checking what your liner looks like when your eyes are open so that you get the finished look you were after. Also, to keep your lipstick on for longer first apply a lip liner and use a lip brush to apply your lipstick. This will also give you more control during application.

 

Quick trick to revamp your look: Eyebrows We all know that your eyebrows can dramatically change your face. To give yourself a quick and almost instant revamp you should change your brows. The right brows can frame your favourite features and change your appearance. If you have a long face and would like to make it look shorter choose a flat brow shape. If you have a round face then choose a brow shape with a high arch. Finally, if you have a heart shaped face, choose brows that balance your face by creating a soft curved arch. Remember, some people benefit from darkening their brows. You could get an eyebrow tint or use an eyebrow pencil to achieve this look.
Instructions: Although a DIY job can work wonders, sometimes getting some professional guidance goes a long way. If you want to change your entire brow shape book an appointment at a brow bar or with a beauty therapist. Then once you’ve had them re-shaped you could maintain your look at home with tweezers.

Quick trick to revamp your look: One statement piece Sometimes a total revamp or makeover isn’t necessary. All you need is one statement piece that ties together your outfit. To find that magical piece of clothing, scour the shops and the internet. Try on lots of different items and explore new styles, cuts and colours. Ideally, your statement piece will have a wow factor so that it can turn an ordinary outfit into one that will turn heads. The key to getting this wow factor is to look for bold, unusual colours. Don’t choose a multi-coloured item though, unless lots of your other clothes are plain. This is because you want to be able to wear your statement piece with a lot of outfits, so choose items in bold, block colours.
Instructions: Your statement piece should be a little out-there and should definitely reflect you and your personality. Take time to find this special item and you’ll soon reap the rewards.

ENVIRONMENT / LIFE - One cool dude: How Parker Liautaud aims to save the world, one polar expedition at a time

 

It’s sunny California, but 17-year-old Parker Liautaud is in furs, preparing to make his fourth polar expedition. As Guy Adams discovers, he’s driven both by concern for our planet and the hubris of youth

 

There are things that you expect to see etched into the face of every polar explorer: grizzle; broken veins; the indelible scars of a few nasty battles with frostbite. Parker Liautaud has yet to accrue a single one of these. The most exotic adornment to his adolescent chin is a faint covering of bum fluff.

Appearances can be deceptive, though. At 17, Parker is already a veteran of three serious polar expeditions. In 2009, aged 14, he visited Antarctica with the explorer Robert Swan. In 2010, just before his GCSEs, he narrowly failed

to become the youngest-ever person to reach the North Pole. And in 2011, he went back for a second shot – arriving at the end of the Earth to the cheers of a helicopter-full of champagne-glugging day-trippers.
We meet amid the hustle, bustle and medical-marijuana stores of Venice Beach. Parker, who recently completed his A-levels, is in California preparing for his fourth and most ambitious journey yet. In December, he's due to begin an epic attempt to become the youngest person to trek to the South Pole, hauling a 250-pound sled across 550 miles of ice sheet. If successful, the trip will cement his status as the most precocious teenage adventurer since the invention of thermal long johns.
After that, while most of his buddies are embarking on gap years, this still-gangly teenager will pursue what amounts to his other great mission in life: saving the planet. Liautaud doesn't just explore frozen wastelands for the sake of it. Instead, as a first-hand witness to the ongoing melting of the world's ice-caps, he designs his adventures to serve a purpose: raising awareness of climate change among his young peers.

To that end, official PR bumpf dubs him: ;campaigner, global policy leader, public speaker, environmental journalist, [and] polar explorer'. Parker describes his priorities in life by saying: "I want to help people understand that we don't have any time left. That we are in a critical few years, with climate change, where the world needs to get past political obstacles, and start to do something substantial to change the course that we're on."
Liautaud is already spreading that word. In the past two years, he has been profiled by Vanity Fair and the New York Times. He's sat on panels with Bob Geldof and Kofi Annan at conferences of One Young World, a sort of Davos summit for the under-25s. He's delivered a million-strong petition to David Cameron at 10 Downing Street, and acquired almost 30,000 Twitter followers. Later this month, he will deliver a speech to pointy-headed fans of the über-prestigious, idea-spreading body, TED.
Are you keeping up? Good. It's also worth mentioning that Parker Liautaud happens to be a very nice young man, with impeccable manners and that quiet sense of self-confidence which is common among the products of blue-chip boarding schools (he spent the past five years at Eton). Born in California, to American and French parents, he and his four siblings spent their formative years in the UK, after their father, a Silicon Valley venture capitalist called Bernard, decided that the family might benefit from a stint in London.
Until 13, Parker was an ordinary kid. That changed after he met Robert Swan, through a mutual friend. They began an e-mail correspondence which escalated into a friendship that eventually saw the then 14-year-old invited to join a trip to the Antarctic. He said yes almost instantly. Friends and family, to whom he'd thus far shown he had no particular interest in outdoor pursuits, particularly polar ones, were perplexed – to say the least.
"I was the second-choice goalkeeper for the third-lowest football team in school. So the prospect of me hauling a sled across miles of snow was kind of a farce, and I was really not taken seriously," he recalls.f "The attitude from people at school was 'You're not going to raise the money and you're not going to get physically fit enough to do it'." He ate lots of chicken, spent a long time in the gym, and proved them wrong.
The following year, Liautaud cooked up a more ambitious plan: to become the youngest-ever person to trek to the North Pole. He found a new accomplice, the veteran explorer Doug Stoup, and through a mixture of charm and luck persuaded General Electric to underwrite the roughly $150,000 (£96,600) cost of the record attempt. Dame Vivienne Westwood designed the Union Jack that he was to raise at his destination, and a small army of news reporters interviewed him in the run-up to the trip.
Then disaster struck. The early months of 2010, when the duo set out, were among the warmest on record, hitting two degrees celcius (the average for that time of year is around -25C). The Pole, which is essentially a GPS location on a constantly-moving collection of ice sheets, became virtually inaccessible, surrounded by patches of uncovered ocean. A trip which had intended to raise awareness of melting ice caps had been thwarted. By melting ice caps.
"The way the ice drifted was devastating," he says of the doomed, 70-mile trek. "We would get up, battle through these difficult conditions for 15 hours, then wake up the next morning and find that we were further away from the Pole than we'd started the previous morning. It was a slap in the face." After 14 days trying, and with rations running low, they abandoned ship.
Liautaud came home, sat his GCSEs, notching-up 11 A* grades, and decided to try again. He raised another six-figure sum, badgering charitable foundations and corporate sponsors into underwriting a new expedition, and set off in spring 2011. Conditions were cold but perfect, and he and Stoup reached the Pole in a jiffy.

"By complete coincidence, we arrived at the moment when a helicopter landed to drop off a group of tourists who'd paid to spend 10 minutes there," he recalls. "Explorers call them 'champagners'. Anyway, it was all a little weird, because 30 people were standing there. It felt like I had just finished a cross-country ski race, or something." He promptly 'checked in' to the North Pole on the social media site, Foursquare. At the time, that was also a first.
While it didn't make him the youngest North-Poler, the success gave Liautaud a platform to continue advocacy against climate change, through both his campaigning website, The Last Degree, and work with pressure groups such as 350.org. His pitch is that it's his generation, rather than the one that today's world leaders belong to, that must push hardest for cuts in carbon emissions. They are the ones with the most at stake.
"I'm nearly 18 years old," he says. "The changes scientists were predicting when I was a child are already happening today. And in my adult lifetime, it's going to get worse." Scientific opinion regarding the existence and scale of the problem is pretty much settled, he argues, adding that the portion of the public which still doubts the reality of man-made climate change – and remains hostile to legislation that might solve it – is largely ill-informed, although "that isn't necessarily their fault".
Liautaud's advocacy work has duly made him enemies. When Anthony Watts, a prominent climate change sceptic, wrote a scathing blog entry criticising one of his polar expeditions, Liautaud was dubbed a "joke", a "twerp" and a "silly little clown" by commenters. One reader described his expedition a "stunt" and said that sending him on it was "the environmentalist version of making your kid a suicide bomber".
In 2010, The Daily Beast, Newsweek's sister internet site, ran an article critical of Parker's parents for letting him explore the Arctic. "It basically said they should be shot for letting me go on the expedition," he says. "Mum and Dad told me they thought it was funny. But I know they felt differently. And I was very upset about that."
Critics have also knocked his Etonian background, and characterised him as a spoilt rich boy, going to the poles "on Daddy's dime". He vigorously disputes that. "I live very comfortably, and I've been very lucky, but it's simply not true," he counters. "From the start, my parents have never paid for any of my trips. I decided from the start that I wanted to raise all the money for every expedition I went on, on my own."
Still more have remarked that, given his globe-trotting lifestyle, Parker should practise a little more of what he preaches. After all, a polar expedition produces plenty of carbon emissions. In response, Parker declares that all his emissions are "triple offset". And he denies any hypocrisy: "I don't actually want people to live with less or travel less or turn off their lights. Because the truth is that the world has never stood for a decrease in development. We've never gone backwards and we are not going to."
Instead, he argues: "The way to do something about climate change is to actually look at the fundamental source of the energy we're using and change that. The only reason fossil fuels are now cheaper than renewables is the amount of investment that goes into making prices lower."
Liautaud's high-profile polar trips are shaping this debate in other ways. As a future scientist (he's off to Yale in September), Parker has contributed to research projects carried out by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the University of Alberta. During his coming South Pole trip, he'll set up two stations to record weather data in the Antarctic.
It sounds like an an exhausting life, fraught with hostility. But Liautaud seems to relish the fight. When you've hauled a sled across hundreds of miles of frozen tundra, lived off freeze-dried food for weeks, and learnt how to ward off a hostile polar bear, attempting to save Planet Earth is all in a day's work.

SCIENCE - How to make a modern Superhero - IRELAND

 

              

JOHN HOLDEN

We all have the potential to be extraordinary – we just don’t all get to realise it and end up being pulled back to average over time due to a natural process called ‘regression to the mean’

WITH HARD work and the right opportunities, all of us have the potential to be extraordinary. But in all likelihood we won’t be. Most of us will likely form the average part of the talent bell curve.
But this has little to do with some predestined determinism. Many factors affect success in life, whatever form that may take. Trinity College Clinical psychologist Dr Ian Roberston just published The Winner Effect, a book which examines the traits and psychology of success.

In statistics there is a theory known as “regression to the mean”. Technically speaking, this refers to the phenomenon that if a variable is extraordinary on its first measurement, it will likely be nearer to the average on a second measurement. The extreme tends to lose its edge over time. This applies to humans as well as numbers.

“Because of the complexity of our brains, every human being is unique and has their own special skill sets,” says Robertson. “Everyone can achieve but in terms of hard objective criteria – such as winning a Nobel Prize or an Olympic medal – the chances of becoming a winner, particularly if your parents were winners, are quite low.

This relates to regression to the mean,” he says. “If you choose any outlier – whether it is height or intelligence or sunny days – a second measurement is much more likely to go back to a lower, smaller, medium point. Most points cluster around the mean.”

Mediocrity loves company. But there are biological and psychological forces at play as well as statistical. “Abilities are partly inherited,” says Robertson. “If your parents are tall you will more than likely be above average. But in terms of natural ability, many people suffer from the curse of genetic fatalism.”

This refers to the theory that those who are naturally gifted from an early age can end up under-performing later in life because of an inability to deal with failure and setbacks. “Any threats to the ego can be very damaging.”

If you are the child of successful parents, things can be even more difficult. Parents expect offspring to achieve as well as they do, which can be a burden that is self-defeating.

Mom and Dad can play dirty too. In his book, Robertson refers to a situation known as “Hiding the ladder”.

“With some parents, success can go to their head,” he says. “They don’t want to recognise that luck played a big part.”

Very often, successful businessmen attribute their success to their unique talent. And so they don’t pass on this vital information to their offspring: that people who achieve in life work hard and are persistent.
“When you’re successful, very often your ego gets inflated and you want to believe yourself to be unique,” he says.

“That’s why you should never praise your kids for their brilliance or innate skill but for their hard work and determination. Otherwise you will build a very vulnerable castle in their head. You often see this in adolescents. Kids who do really well in school hit a setback later in life and fall to pieces.”
At the DCU Centre for Talented Youth Ireland (CTYI), they are well aware of this. Rather than focusing on traditionally broad IQ scores, the CTYI look at specific abilities among its students and then foster “talent development”.

“We look at intelligence over the life cycle of a person,” explains Dr Colm O’Reilly of the CTYI. “An IQ test at age eight is not an indicator of intelligence at 15 years. Interventions are needed all the time so that gifted children meet their potential.

“Besides, IQ scores are an indicator of potential rather than actual classified achievement. It takes a lot of work to keep students at the above average level, so they’re able to still be operating at what would be above the norm.”

The level of practice needed for accomplished athletes and musicians is huge, he adds. Nobel Prize winners work at a much higher and deeper level. While most of us will be prepared to study for five hours a day, they will be doing it for 10. Proficiency, hard work and determination are needed so that we don’t regress back to the mean.

“We work with kids with high ability who could potentially become Nobel Prize winners but not without motivation, intervention and opportunities to challenge themselves. If we don’t stimulate or work with them, they won’t perform to a level above the mean,” O’Reilly said.

If you were to continuously produce offspring, sometimes you would have strong, healthy and gifted children but the majority would be more representative of your average, explains Dr Brian Hughes of NUI Galway.

It also explains why in sports, so many football transfers are a disappointment and why so many managerial transfers fail also. If you look at an athlete’s performance at one particular point in their career it may not be representative of their ability over the long term.

In fact, many athletes are aware of this, particularly those who have achieved big things but then succumbed to the “curse of Sports Illustrated”. Once someone makes the cover of the popular US sports magazine, their careers often go into decline afterwards.

However, black magic is definitely not at play. “Athletes tend to be Player of the Year by the time they make the cover of Sports Illustrated,” says Hughes.

“This means they’re at the height of their careers. This is very often the best they’ll do in their field, so it follows that the following years might not be as good. Everybody will have some good days and some bad days. But you’re most likely to have an average day.”


THE THEORY OF UNLIKELY EVENTS
IN AN INCREASINGLY connected world, one can’t help being dangerously aware of how disorganised things are. Nations are co-operating more than ever but events such as the recent global economic meltdown demonstrate just how fickle our grasp of order really is. Nature plays its own part in keeping things running smoothly but every now and again things go horribly wrong, usually because of something humans have done.

Is there anyone out there who can try to predict and therefore prevent future catastrophes? Mathematicians are working on it. The Theory of Unlikely Events is a sub-branch of Probability Theory, called large deviation theory. “In many stochastic – or random – systems, highly unusual events occur not as a result of one unlikely happening (which would be the case for winning the lottery), but because many unlikely things happen,” explains NUI Maynooth applied mathematician Ken Duffy.

“One example would be an insurance company going bankrupt: it is not typically the case that one single huge claim exceeds reserves, but rather that many individual policies experience claims in a brief window.”

This type of mathematical probability is most useful in assessing information systems and also risk management. Had Ulster Bank a few good mathematicians on their staff, maybe their recent technical disaster could have been averted. Better still, the whole global economic meltdown was probably forecast by number-crunchers who were a little too far away from the action.

“Large deviation theory characterises the likelihood of these sorts of rare events and identifies how, should they happen, they are likely to occur,” says Duffy. “Indeed, the earliest rigorous results in the field were motivated by that very example about a century ago when the Swedish mathematician Harald Cramer wanted to get improved estimates on the likelihood an insurance company would go bankrupt.

“It’s a sophisticated mathematical theory, used broadly in physics and engineering. In operations research, for example, in understanding, for example, how bad backlogs occur in queuing systems.”

COMUNITY - UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

Young heroes bring a smile

Supplying villages with water, helping labourers and orphans are all in a day’s work for these teens

• Image Credit: Courtesy of Lara Mosgofian
• Lara Mosgofian, an American University of Dubai student, launched Project Smile by taking a group of 50 labourers to Safa Park for a picnic lunch, a friendly football match and other fun activities.

 

Dubai: Lazy, careless and spoilt are words often associated with teenagers. However, Gulf News caught up with some young adults who completely shatter that description. In fact the words motivated, influential and hard-working are more suitable descriptions for these youngsters. Supplying villages with running water, helping underprivileged workers and building schools are only a few of the good deeds Aqil Rashid, Natalie Barcicki and Lara Mosgofian have accomplished both locally and internationally.
                          
Aqil Rashid

"My dad was talking to me about how, living here in Dubai, we are more blessed than other people. He encouraged me to help people with the money I had."

Over two years ago, Aqil Rashid was celebrating Eid with his family in Dubai. As part of tradition, children and younger members often receive gifts of cash from elderly relatives and family. Then 14 years old, Rashid realised he received more money than usual, but he decided to do what few teenagers would do; Rashid used the money to help the less fortunate.
The Pakistan national told Gulf News: “My dad was talking to me about how, living here in Dubai, we are more blessed than other people. He encouraged me to help people with the money I had.”

Since then Rashid has been working with Roshan, the leading telecom provider in Afghanistan, to help with their Build A Water Well initiative. The project focuses on building wells in villages that don’t have access to clean drinking water; a minimum of 700 people in each village have access to the well.
Now at 16 years of age, Rashid has decided to take the project one step further to encourage more young people to join the initiative, which is why he started ‘1 Well 700 Lives.’

 

He said: “Thank God, we’ve raised funds for 17 wells, which is $34,000 (Dh125,120). That’s 17 wells in 17 different villages, which impacts 11,900 people.”
Under their latest initiative, Hike 2 Overcome, or H20, the 1 Well 700 Lives drive has organised a trek in Nepal for anyone who wants to help with the project.
“What we’re trying to do is get children involved. Each participant has to raise funds for one well ($2,000/Dh7,360) with the help of sponsors in order to be able to come on the trip in August,” Rashid said.
He believes that many young people want to help communities around the world, but they don’t know how to raise the funds so “this is an easy way to have fun and be part of something good.”
                         
Natalie Barcicki
Natalie Barcicki is one teenager who is not new to charity work and projects. In the March of 2011, she travelled to Kenya under her school’s service club called Habitat for Humanity. Along with the locals, they helped with the construction of basic homes in their village during the week.
Last August she travelled to Nepal for a personal initiative with a friend of hers. Using connections from her school with an orphanage called Ocean, the Polish 18-year-old and her friend stayed at the orphanage for two weeks.
She said: “We worked with the children all day. Playing with them, preparing food for them, studying with them and just giving them the attention they deserve. We took them to school during the week and helped them prepare for their exams.”
Barcicki is not just active on international projects. The Abu Dhabi-based resident also participates in different initiatives at her school.
“The projects have ranged from basic one-off fundraisers like bake sales to longer durations like the Global Issues Conference. I’ve also continued working with the Habitat for Humanity club,” she said.
She credits her interest in community service to her school’s “highly-developed” service programme.
“Every project or event that I participated in was enjoyable for me. At the same time, I got to help other people, which was the most rewarding part of all. The combination of both has allowed me to nurture an interest in service that I hope to carry through into the future,” Barcicki explained.
                         
Lara Mosgofian
At 20 years of age, Lara Mosgofian finally got to accomplish one of her goals to start her own initiative. As part of her senior project at university, the Lebanese national created Project Smile.
“Even though there are many initiatives starting in the UAE, I wanted to start up my own. I love helping other people and especially making them smile. My school requirement was only a push to start this project,” she said.
For her first event in April, Mosgofian took a group of 50 labourers with the help of Adopt-a-Camp to Safa Park for a picnic lunch, a friendly football match and other fun activities.
Following the success of the first Project Smile event, Mosgofian is currently thinking of her next project. ““Before I started this project, I didn’t know where to start and if I would get people’s attention. My advice to others is that there is always a starting point. Nothing happens without hard work, but it is all worth it in the end.”

CHINA / WORLD - CHILDS

Young and innocent

Updated: 2012-06-04 10:51

 

A woman from the Turkana tribe carries a baby on her back at the Lake Turkana Festival in Loiyangalani, Northern Kenya. Carl De Souza / Agence France-Presse

A boy drinks from a water tap in a 'new town' in Koidu, which suffered some of the worst ravages of Sierra Leone's war in the 1990s. Issouf Sanogo / Agence France-Presse

An Afghan woman hugs her child in the old section of Kabul. Their war-torn country still faces poverty, unemployment and lack of infrastructures. Aref Karimi / Agence France-Presse

A group of kindergarten children cheers up in front of camera before their Children's Day performance in Bozhou, Anhui province. Zhang Yanlin / for China Daily

Appreciate the beautiful faces of children on this page as China Daily Sunday edition remembers them in a very special way.

China, like many other countries, celebrated International Children's Day on June 1, which was a holiday for school children. Various activities were held across the country ranging from toy fairs to drawing contests and camping. The occasion is celebrated on various days in different countries. It is observed not only as a day of celebrations, but also as a day devoted to promoting the welfare of children throughout the world. Even in the most desperate corners, people have shown astonishing determination and nurtured high aspirations for children.

Above: A boy slides down in to a swimming pool as the sun shines in the northern German city of Hameln. Left: Children dressed in traditional costumes perform a dance as part of a Folklore Festival in Oldtown Vilnius in Lithuania.

EDUCACION - ESPAÑA

EDUCACIÓN | Competición de talentos en EEUU

Dos jóvenes españoles, en la gran competición de genios de Secundaria de EEUU

Adrià Arbués muestra su software para entrenadores de baloncesto. | ISEF

Ángel Jiménez de Luis | Pittsburgh (EEUU)

Actualizado lunes 21/05/2012 11:27 horas

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Tienen 17 y 18 años pero cuesta creerlo cuando se les escucha hablar de sus respectivos proyectos con el detalle y la terminología que cabría esperar de un estudiante de doctorado. Glòria Macià, estudiante de la Escola Industrial d'Arts i Oficis de Sabadell, ha creado un software capaz de calcular la evolución de una característica genética en una población determinada.
Su interés en este campo surgió al leer una noticia sobre dos padres de raza negra que habían tenido un hijo de piel blanca. A partir de ese caso trató de crear un modelo para entender cómo se dispersan rasgos genéticos a lo largo de los años, aprendió programación y creó un software para poder visualizar el proceso.
"Cuando comencé el proyecto no sabía muy bien donde me llevaría, pero el software tiene muchísimas aplicaciones. Podría usarse en empresas que creen biocombustible a partir de algas, por ejemplo, para determinar cuáles son más productivas y cómo evolucionarán con el tiempo", asegura mientras cambia los diferentes parámetros en el ordenador. Al proyecto le ha dedicado todo un año.
La pasión de Adrià Arbués, estudiante del INS Vilatzara en Vilassar de Mar, era el baloncesto. Hace dos años decidió crear una pizarra electrónica para entrenadores que él mismo usa en sus partidos. Como dispositivo físico la pizarra puede utilizar cualquier tableta, "salvo el iPad, porque lo he desarrollado en flash y no es compatible", dice. El programa permite dibujar las diferentes líneas de movimiento para los jugadores de forma sencilla y mucho más práctica que una pizarra tradicional.

Españoles en un encuentro internacional

Los dos son los primeros representantes de España en la Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) una competición internacional que este año se ha celebrado en la ciudad de Pittsburgh y que ha reunido más de 1.500 proyectos científicos en 17 áreas que van desde las matemáticas hasta la ingeniería y la biología del comportamiento. Ambos lograron la plaza al ganar la competición Exporecerca en Barcelona, la única que la Society for Science and the Public (SSP), organizadora del evento, reconoce como ronda clasificatoria en nuestro país.

La estudiante Glòria Macià. | ISEF

"Estos jóvenes no son 'aprendices' de científicos. Son ya científicos y muchos presentan proyectos con un grado de investigación y calidad similar al que se puede esperar de una tesis doctoral", asegura Wendy Hawkins, directora de la fundación Intel.
La competición reparte más de tres millones de dólares en premios y becas y abre la puerta a las principales universidades de EEUU. "Los proyectos son juzgados por un equipo internacional de grandes investigadores y los candidatos tienen que poder defender su investigación ante ellos. Para muchos es la primera oportunidad de tratar con un doctor en un campo determinado", asegura Hawkins.
ISEF funciona también como la final de la competición nacional de ciencia de educación secundaria estadounidense, lo que explica que dos tercios de los participantes sean de los diferentes estados. "Los estudiantes estadounidenses vienen muy preparados, tienen muchos más medios y hacen este tipo de ferias con frecuencia. Además hay mucha presión para poder entrar en universidades de prestigio", comentan Glòria y Adrià. En esta edición han participado estudiantes de 68 países pero el objetivo de la fundación es abrir la competición a más nacionalidades.
El proyecto de Glòria, titulado 'Análisis y simulación de la pigmentación humana desarrollando un modelo basado en el individuo' ha sido seleccionado como uno de los terceros premios, dotado con una beca de 1.000 dólares. El ganador de este año es un joven estadounidense del estado de Madison, Jack Andraka, que ha desarrollado un método para detectar cáncer de páncreas en los primeros estados de desarrollo mediante el análisis de la orina. Su método es 28 veces más barato y rápido que las técnicas de detección actuales y tiene un 90% de eficacia. ¿Su edad? 15 años.