A*STAR/NTU Visiting Science Writer-in-Residence Programme

Last week at the 2008 AAAS meeting, A*STAR announced an upcoming programme to host two science journalists in Singapore as writers-in-residence. Round-trip travel and living expenses for up to four weeks will be sponsored jointly by A*STAR and NTU’s School of Communication and Information.

More information about the program can be found here at the A*STAR website.

While I think it’s great that the need for good science journalism has been recognised, I have my reservations about how successful this program will be.

First, anecdotal evidence shows that while Singaporean agencies and institutions like to talk big, when push comes to shove, they’ll rather stay within their comfort zones, following the trail of others instead of blazing their own. Here’s a quote, from the website, about science communication in Singapore:

In 2006, The Straits Times, Singapore’s English language broadsheet newspaper, launched a two-page weekly section that is dedicated to science.

Two pages per week in a broadsheet. Starting in 2006. When we’re well in the age of Web 2.0 and all. Erm, hello Upper Management, has the Internet revolution passed you by? And no, putting a pdf copy of some printed text doesn’t count.

(Actually, it might not be all so bad. I hear that Explosion is going to be revamped and moved to an online platform sometime this year. It could be good, or it could end up like Stomp. Oh dear.)

Anyhow, back to the topic of the Writer-in-Residence program - now, given the Singaporean propensity to stick to all things traditional, will the selection process for this program be biased towards old school science journalists, or will the relevant agencies have the foresight to select someone willing and able to embrace the future?

A second reservation about the program: Singapore doesn’t exactly have a stellar track record when it comes to acknowledging and accepting criticism, particularly foreign ones. Given that the announcement of the Writer-in Residence program was made in Boston during the AAAS meeting, it’s pretty evident that the program organisers are looking to invite international science journalists. Now, while they have “no obligation to write on Singapore”, to what extent will they be able to comment on the scientific scene here?

Criticism is important to science - not just the technical, rigorous criticism of peer review, but also the criticism and questioning of why particular lines of research are being pursued. We’re no longer in a time when science is considered an ivory-tower hobby for aristocrats and academics; instead, science policy in this day and age is largely shaped by economic and military needs. An effective science journalist today needs to be able to show the relevance of any scientific enterprise to the general populace - they are, after all, taxpayers funding our research. And in commenting on a country’s science policy, it is almost inevitable that the country’s domestic and foreign policies be put under critical scrutiny as well.

A healthy scientific research program needs a healthy policy of science communication as well. It won’t do anyone any good if all we have are merely cheerleading and “see-how-cool-our-RIs-are” stories in the broadsheets. We need journalists who can do more than just translate jargon into plain English - we need journalists who are good educators as well, to promote a strong culture of scientific literacy and awareness among the populace.

Ever wondered what could be in raw fish?

Now that we’re right in the middle of CNY, here’s some food for thought:

(Fishingkaki.com)

Lo hei!

Knee Power!

Here’s one of those “why didn’t I think of that!” innovations:

Donelan et al, Science, 319, 807 - 810 (200
DOI: 10.1126/science.1149860

Human power generation is an area of research that’s gotten quite hot, mainly because of the sheer number of power-hungry mobile devices each one of us lugs around every day. Many older energy harvesting systems rely on active power generation - that is, the user has to expend energy to drive a dynamo, which increases the human metabolic cost. Such systems aren’t quite appealing, since really, who wants to sweat much more just to charge up your cellphone? (Although it might sell well if packaged as a weight loss device - trim your waistline and charge your phone all at the same time!)

That’s where the ingenuity of the Simon Fraser University team comes in - instead of asking your muscles to generate extra power, why don’t you harvest some of the energy that would be dissipated in walking process instead?

A human stride can be divided into two parts - first, you need to speed up your leg at the start of a stride; second, you need to slow down your leg at the end of the stride. In the normal walking process, the kinetic energy of the leg during this slow down process just gets dissipated and wasted. However, with this device that looks like a knee brace, this kinetic energy is harvested and converted into electrical energy instead. It’s a concept that’s used in electric vehicles - regenerative braking.

Initial uses proposed by the team include personal medical devices that need a constant source of power, but they expect it to be extended it to basically anyone who’s away from a convenient power socket and needs to charge their electronic gadgets.

Or maybe one step further: