The 6th Issue of the Innovation @UAE Magazine: Advancing Humanity (Through Science and Technology)

ADVANCING HUMANITY THROUGH SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

NEURON MAPPING RESEARCH TO HELP FURTHER OUR UNDERSTANDING OF BRAIN FUNCTION

REINFORCING THE ARABIC LANGUAGE TO BUILD THE ARAB WORLD’S FUTURE LEADERS

AUGMENTING EXPERIENCES FOR THE COMMON GOOD

WELCOME TO OUR SIXTH ISSUE

Thanks to this strategic vision that enabled the adoption of smart systems, strategies, initiatives, and plans, the UAE has put investment in science and technology as a top priority and has contributed to making significant strides along the path of human advancement.The UAE’s successful control of Covid-19, and ensuring food security during a global crisis, are salient achievements, among others, during the last five years, which reflect the human progress achieved by the unprecedented focus on STEM disciplines. Put specifically, in 2015, the UAE launched the ‘UAE National Innovation Strategy (NIS)’ that aspires to establish an innovation-enabling environment in innovation-priority sectors such as renewable and clean energy, transportation, technology, education, health, space, and water. The strategy considers innovation in the fields of science and technology, achieved by unconventional ideas and novel products, services, and operations, as a synonym for the social and economic development of the country, represented by improving the quality of life, achieving economic growth, increasing competitiveness, providing new highskilled job opportunities, and promoting

entrepreneurship. The strategy enables the UAE to occupy advanced positions regionally and globally in terms of innovation; namely, the UAE is ranked 1st regionally (the UAE tops MENA for over six consecutive years) , and 31st globally, according to the Global Innovation Index 2022. Innovation@UAE Magazine reflects and traces the innovationrelated activities of academic institutions in the UAE and is a direct reflection of the above-mentioned strategy. Our sixth issue of the magazine focuses on how we can advance humanity through investing in science and technology, and through the great efforts of a number of pre-eminent scholars affiliated with UAE-based scientific institutions such as New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD), Zayed University (ZU), United Arab Emirates University (UAEU), Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI), and other leading institutions. This issue highlights several impactful projects, one of which is the research project of an NYUAD professor who is developing a tool to bring sense of touch to surgeries, using AI and machine learning technologies. It also covers a promising research project conducted by researchers at the University of Sharjah to develop prediction algorithms to stabilise

power grids. Another exciting research is from UAEU that’s focusing on optimal fast charging stations planning for the future high penetration of electric vehicles (EV) in the UAE. I am in awe of how tirelessly these academics and researchers are working to advance not only our country, but humanity as a whole. I was absolutely inspired by the research highlighted in this issue, and I am positive you will be too.

Excellency

Dr. Mohammad Al-Mualla

Undersecretary for Academic Affairs Ministry of Education

His

NYUAD PROFESSOR DEVELOPS A TOOL TO BRING SENSE OF TOUCH TO SURGERIES

Minimally invasive surgeries have greatly evolved in the past couple of decades, with UAE researchers developing a new tool that brings the missing sense of touch to minimally invasive surgeries. Rather than creative large incisions inside a patient’s body, surgeons are now able to insert these tools into smaller incisions. These instruments involve a camera that displays the patient’s internal organs on a screen, while others include tweezers and scissors. Pioneering such state-of-the-art medical technology is Dr. Mohammad Qasaimeh, Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Bioengineering at New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) and his PhD student Wael Othman, in collaboration with surgeons from the Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi. Today, at least 90 percent of surgeries are minimally invasive, allowing for smaller incisions which lead to a number of advantages, including less pain, fewer chances of infection and quicker recovery periods. Through the new NYUAD technology that brings the missing sense of touch, doctors can now assess the different organs

indirectly, allowing them to feel the texture of the different organs and other critical touch elements that have long been missing from these types of operations. Previously, the only connection the surgeon had with his patient’s organ was a 2D view taken from a camera and projected on a screen. However, with the new technology, surgeons are now able to receive vital information about their applied forces during surgery as well as estimating tissue softness. Although seasoned surgeons have their own skills to identify the way different organs feel, junior surgeons, interns, and those specialising in surgery with less experience may not have the same intuitive senses and will greatly benefit from using such technology. Similar work also spans to robotic surgery, which includes the Da Vinci Robot, a 1 million US dollar surgical system that allows the surgeon to perform his duties while in an isolated station. Different elements, such as joysticks and microscope-like goggles allow the surgeon to control the robot. However, a lack of feedback from these robots has made sensory touch that much

more important in surgeries. As a result, laboratories around the world are now developing tactile sensors to be integrated with these technologically advanced medical tools to include a sensory system within robots, further preventing organ damage during surgeries.

Reference Link: https://nyuad.nyu.edu/en/news/latest-news/science-and-technology/2022/june/nyuad-researchers-develop-new-tool-that-brings-missing-sense-of-touch-mis.html#:~:text=A%20 team%20of%20researchers%20from,feel%E2%80%9D%20tissues%20during%20an%20operation.

Dr. Mohammad Qasaimeh Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Bioengineering at New York University Abu Dhabi

UAEU RESEARCHER FOCUSES ON BUILDING COUNTRY’S FUTURE GREEN MOBILITY

RESEARCHERS USE MACHINE LEARNING FOR EARLY FIRE WARNING

A researcher from the United Arab Emirates University (UAEU) has been working on the UAE’s green mobility by focusing on optimal fast charging stations planning in preparation for the future high penetration of electric vehicles (EV) in the UAE.

Dr. Hussain Shareef, Professor of Electrical and Communication Engineering at the University, has been concentrating his work on optimum locations for fast charging stations across the country to reverse the current low penetration due to a lack of infrastructure available. Such work is crucial as an increase in charging stations will inevitably lead to cost-effectiveness for each station erection going forward.

Dr. Shareef’s project, in collaboration with the Emirates Centre for Transportation, also tackles users’ satisfaction by reducing

their waiting time, pinpointing locations with stability and minimal impact on the power grid. His research is timely and significant, considering the UAE’s Energy Strategy 2050, which aims to increase the contribution of clean energy in the total mix from 25 to 50 percent by 2050 and reduce carbon footprint of power generation by 70 percent, saving Dh700 billion. Depleting fossil fuel reserves and rising petrol prices represent other incentives for the importance of such work.

Dr. Shareef believes more than 40 percent of vehicles in the UAE will be electric by 2050, as the infrastructure in the country has already begun developing. Currently, the UAEU possesses a few free EV charging stations that serve as an incentive and a motivation for students and faculty to increasingly adopt green mobility.

Reference Link: https://www.uaeu.ac.ae/en/research/research-highlights/optimal-fast-charging-stations-planning-for-future-high-penetratio-of-electric-vehicle.shtml

Indoor fire disasters cause severe property damage and cost human lives. Yet although commercial fire alarms are effective in detecting flaming fires, they cannot detect the presence of smoldering fires, which develop very slowly and do not emit much heat when compared to flaming fires. As a result, by the time a fire alarm detects them, they are already out of control, having caused severe damage. This is the field of research undertaken by Dr. Mohammad Nazir, Associate Professor at the College of Technological Innovation at Zayed University, in his paper entitled “Early fire detection: a new indoor laboratory dataset and data distribution analysis”. By focusing on machine learning, he addressed the issue at hand. “Today, video scenes from a surveillance camera are being used in almost all advanced fire detection systems to solve this issue. However, surveillance cameras breach people’s privacy and are very costly to deploy and maintain. Surprisingly, very few researchers and scientists really have explored how to analyse chemical properties such as humidity, temperature, MQ139, Total Volatile Organic Compounds (TVOC) and eCO2 to

detect smoldering fires,” he explained. Upon further investigation, Nazir and his team observed that this is due to the limited data available on indoor fire scenarios. As a result, and for the development of future machine learning-based fire warning systems, machine learning practitioners urgently need a complete fire experiments dataset that covers fire types and scenarios of flammable materials commonly found in homes and offices. To address this issue, the team gathered important chemical data from controlled realistic fire experiments conducted in an indoor laboratory environment. The experiments were conducted in a controlled manner by triggering the source of fire using electrical devices and charcoal on paperboard, cardboard or clothing. In fact, these researchers were the first to collect such data, and, to date, their publicly available dataset has been used by machine learning researchers around the world to develop their fire detection systems. The project was also supported by EXPO 2020, Dubai, through EXPO Live Agreement EL-RA013-. In the future, the team plans to create additional experiments to include various

other fire scenarios and the addition of sensors, such as LPG gas leakage sensors. Expanding its datasets will help machine learning practitioners develop more accurate and robust early warning fire detection systems. “One day, we hope that the fire warning systems will be so accurate and sophisticated that we will no longer hear any news on the loss of human lives or severe property damage from fire disasters,” Nazir concluded.

Dr. Hussain Shareef Professor of Electrical and Communication Engineering at the United Arab Emirates University

Dr. Mohammad Amril Nazir Associate Professor in the college of Technological Innovation at the Zayed University

RESEARCHERS DEVELOP PREDICTION ALGORITHMS TO STABILISE POWER GRIDS

MACHINE LEARNING REACHES NEW HEIGHTS IN DATA PRIVACY

In today’s world, in which power systems are continuously being upgraded by integrating renewable energy sources (RES) to reduce the carbon footprint, the need for prediction algorithms has become all the more vital. Accurate prediction algorithms have increasingly proven beneficial in estimating stochastic processes, such as the weather, the stock market, and energy, among others. These accurate predictions can be utilised in a multitude of ways, namely, to reduce loss due to uncertainty. This critical work is being undertaken by a team of researchers, including Dhananjay Kumar, H. D. Mathur and S. Bhanot, alongside Ramesh C. Bansal, professor in the Electrical Engineering Department at the College of Engineering at the University of Sharjah. Through their project, “Forecasting of Solar and Wind Power using Long Short-Term Memory Recurrent Neural Networks (LSTM RNN) for Load

Frequency Control in an Isolated Microgrid”, the team focuses on ensuring the stability of modern power systems, including RES, such as solar and wind. If left unmonitored, these sources become highly unreliable due to a heightened level of uncertainty. Poor inertia also makes them highly sensitive to power

system disturbances, such as a sudden rise or fall in supply or demand. In addition, the increased penetration of RES on a daily basis renders the existing grid all the more sensitive to disturbances from such sources.

The sudden rise or fall in the generating capacity of solar or wind power plants may create frequency instability in the power system and lead to a cumulative blackout. As a result, accurate monitoring becomes critical to ensuring the frequency stability of supply or demand in microgrids. This entails searching for an efficient prediction algorithm. The team’s work, published in the International Journal of Modelling and Simulation, proposed a forecasting method, the LSTM RNN, based on deep learning. Such a method more accurately predicts the renewable power coming from RES when compared to other reported methods. Consequently, the predicted power from solar and wind are fed into a microgrid inertial model, and the frequency response against load rise or fall is recorded. Such cutting-edge research is vital for the future, where maintaining the stability of a power system will become of great concern. As the inertia of power networks is expected to be

too low to remain stable on its own, the role of forecasting algorithms based upon neural networks will play a crucial role in monitoring and controlling secondary or backup sources of energy. Several organisations have already started procuring their own microgrids to reduce their dependency on the main grid – within such conditions, the forecasting of RES in isolated microgrids becomes paramount for voltage control and frequency stability.

A new branch of machine learning is being explored by a professor in the UAE through his research on Federated Learning , also known as collaborative learning. In his study, entitled “How can we progress the machine learning field if we might lose access to data due to privacy requirements?”, Dr. Samuel Horvath, Assistant Professor of Machine Learning at the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI), focuses on machine learning models that are collaboratively trained in a decentralised fashion by many clients, such as mobile devices or whole companies. Within this realm, data is never transferred nor exchanged, it is kept locally, while the learning objective is meant to be achieved using focused updates intended for immediate aggregation.Currently, the dominant paradigms in machine learning are centralised techniques where all the local clients’ datasets are uploaded to one server. Such a process carries a severe disadvantage to it as it creates negative client experience due to the privacy implications of this ever-increasing centralised data collection. In addition, several government

entities have already enforced privacy policies to protect users’ data, such as the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) in the European Union. “These government regulations and users’ reluctance to share their private data will eventually lead to the limited availability of data, breaking one of the core pillars behind machine learning success. This is where Federated Learning comes to help us by bringing training to the edge, with decentralised clients, enabling collaborative training by multiple actors to build a common, robust machine learning model without sharing data, thus allowing us to address these critical privacy and data-access issues,” Dr. Horvath explained.

Federated Learning has already been used in several commercial applications, such as Apple’s ‘Hey Siri’ and QuickType, or Google’s ‘Hey Google’ and Gboard. On the other hand, the concept is still relatively new, with more to come in the future. Ultimately, Dr. Horvath hopes that Federated Learning will revolutionise areas where data privacy is the priority. A few examples he shared include applications such as smart health or fintech, where, historically, there would

Reference Link: https://mbzuai.ac.ae/news/powerful-predictions-and-privacy/

be no access to large data corpora due to data-sharing issues. As a new paradigm in machine learning, Federated Learning brings with it specific challenges which differentiate it from standard centralised machine learning. In particular, an essential aspect Dr. Horvath is actively researching, is reducing the communication burden during the Federated Learning process. Another critical challenge includes clients’ system heterogeneity, such as the network connection speed, bandwidth, storage and computational capacity. The challenge also encompasses statistical heterogeneities,like non-identical data distributions across the federated network, that introduce obstacles to designing efficient architectures and training or optimisation methods for Federated Learning. Finally, privacy is also a major concern in Federated Learning applications, where one of the critical research directions is to design efficient methods with formal privacy guarantees. In his research, Dr. Horvath aims to overcome some of these issues with a unified goal of enabling efficient collaborative machine learning without centralised data.

Dr. Samuel Horvath Assistant Professor of Machine Learning at the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence

Dr. Ramesh C. Bansal Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Sharjah

GOLD NANOPARTICLES PHOTOCATALYST USED TO HELP CONVERT CO2

PIONEERING RESEARCH AROUND GENOMICS OF RARE DISEASES IN THE MIDDLE EAST

As countries strive to reach net-zero by 2050, striking a balance between the amount of greenhouse gas produced and the amount removed from the atmosphere, a team of researchers in the UAE is making its own sustainable impact by turning CO2 into useful products by using gold nanoparticles. Dr. Dinesh Shetty, Assistant Professor in Chemistry at Khalifa University, is leading collaborative research with New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) and the National Chemical Institute in Slovenia, in developing, designing and synthesising advanced materials for energy conversion. The project’s main goal lies in converting CO2, which is abundant and free, into valueadded products.As a greenhouse gas, CO2 is commonly referred to with a negative connotation. However, Dr. Shetty aims to transform this perception, using it for the benefit of society as part of his work’s purpose.Some of the value-added products the research has created include carbon monoxide (CO) and methane, both of which have a strong industrial value. CO is one

of the chemicals used in several chemical conversions in the industry, while methane gas represents a valuable industrial gas that is also used in cooking on a daily basis.Gold nanoparticles serve as a beneficial material in the photocatalytic method used by the team, which absorbs light and uses it to convert CO2 into other products. Reusability is another benefit of such material. “We did at least four or five cycles just to prove the concept but technically, we can do more. This work is important because we are talking about zero carbon by 2050 and carbon dioxide in our atmosphere is increasing temperatures around the world because it is a greenhouse gas. Thus, it is not only about reducing it from the atmosphere. The best scenario for us is almost mitigating it from the atmosphere because if we continue business as usual, statistics confirm that many places will be underwater by 2050 because sea levels are going to continue increasing,” Dr. Shetty explained.Rather than storing the gas underground or absorbing it from the atmosphere, the

Reference Link: https://www.ku.ac.ae/turning-co2-into-useful-products-using-gold-nanoparticles-embedded-in-a-novel-material

team of researchers is removing it in its entirety to help achieve the zero-carbon goal. The beneficial value-added products from a free source also help create a viable circular economy cycle. Looking ahead, Dr. Shetty plans on developing many materials for the UAE’s priority areas, including blue ammonia production, battery, and hydrogen production. He is also focusing on making the material more efficient and scalable, in order to make it commercially viable

Rare diseases are increasingly coming into the spotlight in the Middle East as local researchers work on mapping out the region’s genomic database. Dr. Ahmad Abou Tayoun, Director of the Genomics Center of Excellence at Al Jalila Children’s, Associate Professor of Genetics at the Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences, and a Clinical Molecular Geneticist, is leading research through his paper entitled “The Genomic Landscape of Rare Disorders in the Middle East”. Rare diseases affect less than 1 in 200,000 individuals. However, with 6,000 rare diseases in the world, they impact more than 450 million people globally. They are clinically unrecognisable and complex due to their multi-system presentations. They pose a diagnostic odyssey, which entails recurrent hospitalisation of patients within a time period of five to seven years, as well as ineffective treatment or management plans and no working diagnosis. As a result, they have become a significant economic and societal burden. However, 80 percent of such diseases have a genetic aetiology, highlighting the importance of using genomics and genetics early on to attempt finding a diagnosis and place the patient on a diagnostics track. “This is what is known in the west, where diagnostic systems are currently more advanced. In the Middle East, we are aware of the high presence of rare diseases due to the relatively higher rates of marriages between relatives. However, there is hardly any data from the region that has been shared worldwide. Therefore, we do not know the exact burden of rare disorders,” Dr. Abou Tayoun explained. Although he expects the figure to be high, the actual genetic data to quantify the burden is still unknown as most countries in the Middle East lack the required resources or, at times, regulations

hinder sharing genetic data beyond borders. A lack of appropriate skillsets, such as trained genetic counsellors and clinical molecular geneticists, as well as facilities to deliver these services to patients, have also become obstacles for the region to being able to truly thrive in the field. However, one of the main strengths of Dr. Abou Tayoun’s paper is found in attempting to solve this issue in the Middle East. His team was able to establish one of the region’s first paediatric genomic centers in the UAE, which contains multidisciplinary teams under the same umbrella. Such a center is key for rare diseases as many of them emerge as multi-system disorders. The center contains a laboratory which is accredited by the College of American Pathologists and this laboratory offers stateof-the-art genetic tests. In addition, there are trained specialists and genetic counsellors, who Dr. Abou Tayoun refers to as the vehicle between the laboratory, the caring physicians and the patients. The study details the team’s experience with over 500 patients, revealing data and different genomic testing technologies which have been explored in the west. “We sequence all 20,000 genes in the human genome for each patient, providing a diagnostic yield of around 40 percent. Thus, 4 out of 10 patients who go through the testing end up with a diagnosis, which is an improvement. Other testing modalities in the past have had around a 1 to 2 percent diagnostic yield,” he explained. The study also shows that 70 percent of the presenting patients were less than five years of age, which entails early intervention and management, consequently helping shorten the diagnostic odyssey. In the past, families from the Middle East commonly travel abroad for genetic testing. Today, Dr. Abou Tayoun’s work is filling that gap. “The genetic world

is moving towards finding new therapies based on genetic findings. We lay out a large number of mutations in the paper in over 200 genes, and over a third of them are not found in worldwide disease databases. They are found all over the Middle East providing targets for new therapies, hence, it is vital to disclose such data. There is a huge beneficial impact locally and globally,” he concluded. The project’s next steps include launching major projects as an outcome of such research, one of which focuses on rapid whole genome sequencing in the intensive care unit – the first to offer such a service in the Middle East. Over the next few years, at least 200 families will be enrolled in the project. The team is also working on an initiative of new-born screening for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA). The initiative will include the screening of 6,500 Emirati new-borns over the next four years and will help to develop an understanding of the epidemiology of the disease and its prevalence. It will also provide lifesaving gene therapy.

Dr.

Ahmad Abou Tayoun Director of the Genomics Center of Excellence at Al Jalila Children's Specialty Hospital, Associate Professor of Genetics at the Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences, and Clinical Molecular Geneticist

Dr. Dinesh Shetty Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Khalifa University

UAE RESEARCHER SIMPLIFIES HUMAN INTERACTION THROUGH HAND GESTURES

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY HELPING PRESERVE ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITES

Science and technology are increasingly occupying a major role in the lives of humans, helping shape and improve daily tasks and interactions. One of such ways is described in a project entitled “Detection of Hand Gestures with Human Computer Recognition by Using a Support Vector Machine”, undertaken by Dr. Rasha Almajed, Assistant Professor at the College of Computer Information Technology at the American University in the Emirates. The research involves building a Computer

Human Interaction system for hand gesture

detection, with the aim of simplifying the way in which humans interact with computers, particularly for people with determination. The study also proves useful in several fields, such as robotics.Dr. Almajed and her team tested augmentation strategies on a subset of three classes, before discovering that training all three classes on a single multi-class HCI was more successful for augmenting data than using a separate network to generate samples for each class.

Reference Link: http://pen.ius.edu.ba/index.php/pen/article/viewFile/2866/1138

“Because multi-class HCI uses a larger number of training samples and different classes, it is more likely to capture both the underlying structure of a hand position and the unique variations across the action classes,” she explained.Dr. Almajed proposed in her research a gesture recognition algorithm using support vector machines (SVM) and a histogram of oriented gradient (HOG) based on previous work, using the CNN model to classify gestures. The goal of the algorithm is to detect gestures with real-time processing speed, minimising interference, and reducing the ability to capture unintentional gestures. In the study, static gesture controls include on, off, up, and down. “Overall, the thesis’ principal goals were accomplished. The established architecture was put into place and proved to be beneficial in terms of data augmentation. Furthermore, the HCI was evaluated and compared to a variety of alternatives using appropriate assessment measures.” Dr Almajed said.The next steps of the research will involve applying the same concept using different algorithms to speed up the process in real-time.Today, such work is crucial as computers have become an important and inseparable part of society, influencing many aspects of daily lives in terms of communication and interaction. Countries across the GCC are currently focusing on ways to speed up performance and serve people in a more efficiency manner. “That is why we have been focusing on the main part of the human body which we all somehow understand the language of: the hand,” Dr Almajed concluded.

Constant detection and monitoring of archaeological sites and objects has always been an important national goal for many countries. As such, the early identification of changes is crucial to preventive conservation. Archaeologists have long considered using service drones to automate collecting data on and below the ground surface of archaeological sites, although cost and technical barriers have been the main hurdles against wide-scale deployment. However, advances in thermal and depth imaging, drones, and artificial intelligence (AI) have driven the cost down and improved the quality and volume of data collected and processed. Research in the field is also developing, namely within a study entitled “Autonomous Service Drones for Multimodal Detection and Monitoring of Archaeological Sites”, undertaken by Dr. Adel Khelifi, Professor of CS and IT at the College of Engineering at Abu Dhabi University. The research proposes an endto-end framework for archaeological sites’ detection and monitoring using autonomous service drones. “We mount RGB, depth, and thermal cameras on an autonomous drone for low-altitude data acquisition. To align and aggregate collected images, we propose two-stage multimodal depth-to-RGB and

thermal-to-RGB mosaicking algorithms. We then apply detection algorithms to the stitched images to identify change regions and design a user interface to monitor these regions over time,” he explained. Results have shown that overlays of aligned thermal and depth data can be created on RGB mosaics of archaeological sites. Tests on the team’s change detection algorithm also revealed that it has a root mean square error of 0.04. To validate the proposed framework, they tested their thermal image stitching pipeline against state-of-the-art commercial software. The results have shown that the team was able to cost-effectively replicate its functionality while adding a new depth-based modality and create a user interface for temporally monitoring changes in multimodal views of archaeological sites. Such work in remote and nondestructive examination of cultural heritage sites holds many advantages, including obtaining data without damage to the historic site, and the collection of information that no other technique is capable of extracting. As many heritage sites are currently threatened by anthropogenic and natural destruction, the team’s mission is to help in heritage detection and monitoring for the preservation and integrity of cultural

heritage. “Heritage is the cultural legacy which we receive from the past, which we live in the present and which we will pass on to future generations,” Dr. Khelifi shared as a UNESCO quote to highlight the importance of cultural heritage preservation.In times of crisis and war, such as in Syria and Iraq in the past few years, archaeological looting has furiously amplified, with the destruction of many archaeological sites for religious, political, or economic reasons. Therefore, the project’s next steps include helping governmental authorities to protect and preserve their archaeological sites from potential looting that might occur. By proposing a method to classify looting actions using computer vision and deep learning, the aim will be to create a way in which authorities can rapidly identify where looting is taking place or is likely to take place. This will then enable them to patrol their sites remotely, as authorities often do not have resources available to protect every site. Reference Link: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/355949645_Autonomous_Service_Drones_for_Multimodal_Detection_and_Monitoring_of_Archaeological_Sites

Dr. Rasha AlMajed

Assistant Professor in the College of Computer Information Technology at the American University in the Emirates

Dr. Adel Khelifi Associate Professor of Computer Science and IT in the College of Engineering at the Abu Dhabi University

INNOVATIVE RESEARCH IMPROVES HEALTHCARE SYSTEM INTEGRATION

Ground-breaking innovative and practical methods are being developed to ease a patient’s journey within healthcare organisation facilities. In a study entitled “Medical Data Integration Using HL7 Standards for Patient’s Early Identification”, Dr. Adi AlQudah, Researcher and PhD graduate from BUiD (British University in Dubai), focused on essential information system integration, particularly in the healthcare sector where patient privacy, safety, and satisfaction are all influenced by interoperability standards. By using the Emirates ID, a patient's early identification solution was proposed to reduce waiting times in outpatient department at healthcare facilities. As a result, a significant outcome of the study was reached, in terms of reducing the "patient's journey time" by approximately 14 minutes.

Such promising results can be beneficial to eliminate long queues and their related stress for both patients and healthcare workers. The proposed solution is crucial to maintaining a patient’s satisfaction and privacy. Moreover, the resolution focuses on prolonged queues that can produce high levels of distraction for healthcare workers, rather than focusing on their primary tasks. Going forward, Dr. AlQudah believes a similar solution can be simulated in other healthcare facilities with different settings. He mentioned a study expansion that can be proposed by redesigning and automating the patient transfer between triage and treatment rooms. For instance, walk-in patients can be routed automatically to less-occupied treatment rooms using the application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and without the intervention of nurses.

Dr. Adi AlQudah Researcher and PHD graduate from the British University in Dubai

Dr. Hanada Taha

Reviving education in Arabic has been a research theme for Dr. Hanada Taha, Endowed Chair Professor of Arabic Language at Zayed University. Through her work, the former acting Dean of Bahrain Teachers College aims to build strong future leaders for the Arab region. Her journey began when she witnessed a difference in language proficiency among children, which she deemed as unfair. Dr. Taha’s interest in children’s learning process started to grow, focusing on the requirements needed to build a love for Arabic and a proficiency in the language. She discovered this to be a common issue to all schools, particularly after working on national literacy strategies with many countries, such as Saudi Arabia,

Jordan and Morocco, before reaching the conclusion that children were uninspired and not proficient. It was here that she received her calling to boost Arab proficiency. Dr. Taha’s work kicked off on several fronts:

• research on teaching the language to native learners

• to be able to analyse the challenges, needs and future prospects for effective practices

• adopting a holistic and scientific approach to understand the field in depth.

To ensure her research was not only based in theory, Dr. Taha also delved into hundreds of Arabic language classroom observations across all grade levels in Morocco, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Lebanon,

the US, Oman and Bahrain. Over the years, such work provided her with the knowledge of mutual issues within classrooms and among teachers, and the specifics by country and school systems – an eyeopening moment in her career. Her work has spanned across several entities, which has allowed her to gain an understanding of the Arabic language on a national, regional and global level. Dr. Taha believes such an effort is collective in nature, although her role is to convince, to demonstrate, and to present the latest, most effective practices for teaching the language, which then affect literacy strategies. Most importantly, the different education and linguistic policies pertaining to the Arabic language across

multiple countries are at the forefront of such work. She has also emphasised the significant economic investment as she believes language and the economy go hand in hand. “You will invest in students for 12 to 16 years and, in the end, they should have mastery of the language. If they do not, this is an investment that is lost. There are political and economic implications, and my focus is the educational one. On my side, it is important to flag such issues,” Dr. Taha said. She highlighted the most common concern in the Arab World as one where countries are not able to practice nor implement as much as they intend. Her goal is to align aspirations, dreams and official guidelines that are written about Arabic with excellent on-the-ground implementation. This will involve bringing such awareness to practitioners, raising awareness of the language, and creating more programmes in literary Arabic to increase children’s exposure. The challenge stretches as far as highlighting Arabic in the community at large, further to just being in schools. This includes listening to more Arabic music in malls, as Dr. Taha calls it a hidden curriculum, while focusing on more Arabic writing and calligraphy in schools, as well as Arab

Islamic architecture, which belongs to the culture itself. “We spend our lives unaware of all of these and these are all challenges we need to highlight,” she added. Her current work at Zayed University focuses on establishing the Arabic Language Research Centre, which will be completely dedicated to teaching and learning, while bringing entities and exporting best practices and success stories in Arabic to the community and the region. Dr. Taha is also conducting further research on exploring the possibility of teaching Arabic and English side by side from Grade 1 or to immerse them in Arabic from Grades 1 to 3 followed by the introduction of English. “I believe students should learn Arabic first because of our current context and due to the fact that it is not emphasised as much in the public arena. We need to focus our efforts on it. We are also working with Dr. Haitham Taha, an expert in reading difficulties, to design the first reading difficulties screening tool as an app to help with early detection and intervention for children with reading difficulties in Arabic,” she noted. In parallel, Dr. Taha is also working on a project with the Abu Dhabi Arabic Language Centre to collaborate on a children’s corpus in

an aim to find out the first 5,000 words students require to learn in the language. Her work extends to translating key pieces of research as many are currently published in English. “We are a very small group of people, but we need funding and support.

I am very hopeful - there are amazing and promising things happening in the UAE but we need to get all of this into schools, this is where the masses are. If the teachers do not know what to do with the books, then you will lose the children, thus it is about targeting Arabic teacher preparation and training,” she concluded.

Title of published paper: Arabic Language Arts Standards: Revolution or Disruption Published in: Research in Comparative and International Education (4(13(, pp. 569 –551 ( .

Journal metrics:

• Impact factor: Real-Time Journal's Impact Oct, 2022: 3.0

• CiteScore ranking 1.9 :2021-2020

• H-index: 21

Scientific Journal Ranking (SJR(: Q,2 0.472. Ranked 497# over 1,319 related journals in the Education research category. The ranking percentile is around %62 in the field of Education.

Project funded by: Zayed University.

REINFORCING THE ARABIC LANGUAGE TO BUILD FUTURE LEADERS OF THE ARAB WORLD CHILDREN ACROSS ARAB NATIONS AND THE REGION LACK MASTERY OF THE ARABIC LANGUAGE. ONE PROFESSOR IS HOPING TO BE AN AGENT OF CHANGE WITHIN THIS REALM.

Associate Dean of Research and Awareness and Endowed Professor of Arabic language at Zayed University

Dr. Reem Khalil

With an interest in brain development, general biology, human anatomy and physiology, as well as neurobiology, Dr. Reem Khalil, an Associate Professor in Neuroscience at the American University of Sharjah (AUS), has been studying the visual cortex, which mediates humans’ ability to see. Her main research interests lie in examining the organisation and development of the mammalian visual cortex, with a specific focus on the developmental refinement of circuits that link different visual areas of the brain. She possesses a strong expertise in performing anatomical tracer injections, as well as immunohistochemical staining methods. A main focus in Dr. Khalil’s

laboratory is to study how the different areas which construct the visual cortex are actually interconnected. These connections between the various areas mediate different aspects of visual perception, such as colours and shapes. With the knowledge of neurons – the basic building blocks of the brain, Dr. Khalil and her team have decided to take their research a step further. Dr. Khalil’s most recent interest includes the neuron mapping project, which involves a collaboration with mathematicians at the American University of Sharjah, including Dr. Sadok Kallel, Pawel Dlotko from the Dioscuri Centre in Topological Data Analysis at the Institute of Mathematics at the

Polish Academy of Sciences; and Ahmad Farhat, a computational researcher also affiliated with the Dioscuri Centre with a background in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. “What we have done is examine the actual shape of neurons that give rise to these connections in the brain. The shape of neurons is referred to as morphology. Since we know that there are variations in the 3D shape of neurons in different areas of the brain, we sought to cluster and classify neuronal populations in effort to reveal these differences. Revealing differences in morphology tells us something about the kind of function that a neuron participates in or mediates, as well as what kind of computations the neuron performs. Thus, by looking at the 3D structure or the morphology of neurons in specific areas, we can reveal differences in the morphology. Ultimately the hope is that these differences will also tell us something about the function of each population of neurons in each of these areas,” explained Dr. Khalil, who pursued a postdoctoral fellowship in the Biology Department at City University of New York in the United States. This collaborative project with Dr. Kallel involved the use of topology, which is a branch of geometry, to devise mathematical descriptors to separate these classes of neurons. The team used datasets from an online repository which contained the 3D

rendering of actual neurons that exist in brains from various species. Such neurons have been reconstructed in humans, monkeys, cats, and rats, although the initial objective of the work was to conduct such research on a species that Dr. Khalil regularly works with: the ferret. However, the COVID19- pandemic delayed such experiments. As a result, the team hopes to conduct anatomical injections in a ferret’s visual cortex and obtain 3D reconstructions of neurons, specifically in the ferret’s brain specifically. “That is where the next phase of the project is or the continuation of what we have worked on before. Previously, we used datasets already published online and analysed these datasets that comprise different reconstructions from multiple areas. However, we used reconstructions from the mouse brain, from the rat brain, from the human brain, and other datasets as well,” she stated. So far, the team has recently published the ongoing work in a prestigious journal called the “Public Library of Science Computational Biology”, with related projects underway in parallel. Ultimately, the overarching research theme in the laboratory is to essentially map out how the connections among the visual areas develop and mature with normal experience. Such work is paramount as Dr. Khalil used

the example of young individuals with visual abnormalities, such as a cataract or a lazy eye, which will inevitably affect visual function as an adult. As such, mapping how these connections develop and mature over time in a normal ferret will hopefully lead to an understanding of when abnormal events happen, and potentially provide therapeutic interventions before these maladaptive events arise. “Ultimately, what we are interested in revealing is – and this is relevant to human visual perception as well – how does the brain develop normally? And how do abnormal events that arise during development affect the brain structurally, leading to visual dysfunction?” The popularity of ferrets as model organisms in visual neuroscience research, and specifically in neurodevelopmental research, has increased because of their long period of brain development and the potential links that can be drawn with human visual development. Ferrets are also widely used by researchers because they are born at an early stage of development, which makes them developmentally immature. As such, scientists can study events that happen in the brain postnatally or after they are born. Otherwise, these events would happen, for instance, with monkeys in utero, while the fetus is still developing inside the uterus,

which makes it difficult for researchers to access. Dr. Khalil’s work also extends to other projects. One project involves a team of mechanical engineers from the University of Michigan - Dearborn, as they attempt to 3D print neurons. The 3D printing project will serve as an educational resource in neuroscience education and enhance student comprehension using physical models of scaled neurons. Another project Dr. Khalil is working on involves using computational tools such as principal component analysis (PCA) and hierarchical clustering analysis to assess the morphology of pyramidal cells in different visual areas of the monkey brain’s development. The researchers discovered that specific morphological features related to the size of neurons require a long period of development to mature. The group used a public repository to acquire the 3D neuronal reconstructions for their analysis. The results help advance our understanding of how the morphology neurons is refined across development. The project, entitled “Developmental Changes in Pyramidal Cell Morphology in Multiple Visual Cortical Areas Using Cluster Analysis”, was published in “Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience”.

Title of published paper: Developmental Changes in Pyramidal Cell Morphology in Multiple Visual Cortical Areas Using Cluster Analysis Published in: Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience

Journal metrics:

•Impact factor: Real-Time Journal's Impact Oct, 2022: 4.8

• CiteScore ranking 2020-2021: 4.7

• H-index: 60

Scientific Journal Ranking (SJR(: Q2, 0.8. Ranked #8 over 24 related journals in the Neuroscience (miscellaneous) research category. The ranking percentile of Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience is around 68% in the field of Neuroscience (miscellaneous). Project funded by: Grants from the Faculty Research Grant (FRG) American University of Sharjah (AUS); and Patients Friend’s Committee Fund, Sharjah, UAE.

NEURON MAPPING RESEARCH AT THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY OF SHARJAH TO HELP FURTHER OUR UNDERSTANDING OF BRAIN FUNCTION A TEAM OF RESEARCHERS ARE STUDYING THE INTERCONNECTION AMONG DIFFERENT AREAS OF THE VISUAL CORTEX IN FERRETS TO TRACK THEIR MATURITY OVER DEVELOPMENT, IN AN AIM TO MAKE SENSE OF HUMANS’ BRAINS.

Associate Professor in Neuroscience at the American University of Sharjah

As the director of the research laboratory for Computer Human Intelligence at New York University – Abu Dhabi (NYUAD), Dr. Tuka Al Hanai, Assistant Professor of Computer Engineering, has a long line of experience in this field. Her journey began during her undergraduate studies in Electrical Engineering at the Abu Dhabi Petroleum Institute. Throughout the years, she amassed a great deal of knowledge through mentorship and professors who guided and encouraged her to continue pursuing excellence. Since then, her work has been featured in major publications,

such as The Wall Street Journal, and Wired, and she frequently publishes at top tier research venues, such as AAAI, ACL and IEEE). She has also been the recipient of the MIT Technology Review’s 10 Innovators Under 35 MENA Award in 2018, as well as the UAE Government Excellence Award in 2019. Dr. Al Hanai’s parents encouraged her to pursue science, technology, engineering, and mathematics – topics she was thoroughly interested in. With excellence in mind, she undertook a Master’s and PhD in Computer Science at MIT’s graduate school, where she explored research domains

through much independent work. At the time, machine learning and AI had started gaining popularity. “I was very lucky to be in the right environment to master some of those skills that are required to do impactful research with machine learning, AI and data sets,” Dr. Al Hanai recalled. Following her PhD, she joined NYUAD’s vibrant research community, which is extremely active in cutting edge research. The open, progressive, and forward-looking environment truly fit Dr. Al Hanai’s personality. As part of a research team of approximately six to eight scientists, their work focuses on applying machine

learning to real world application, including detecting depression in conversations based on a speech recording. The team looks for use cases for machine learning where, typically, a human is involved in decision making, such as medical doctors screening their patients for depression. Such technologies can augment their work using an AI algorithm that screens the patients’ speech. Dr. Al Hanai’s work is timely, as AI has been revolutionising the way in which society lives, reshaping several different areas. From voice and facial recognition to medical imaging and decision-making, the technology is serving humanity on a multitude of levels. Dr. Al Hanai’s team has developed previous versions of their current project, continuously building on their learnings. The research has led to the collection of one of the largest data sets for speech and depression analysis and detection, which the team is currently exploring. “The research itself takes 6 to 12 months, but its deployment into the real world is a different process and it takes a different skillset. It takes the greater

market and a larger set of institutions to adopt the research, therefore it could take years. However, it is important because, as humans, we make a lot of decisions every day, from doctors and HR managers to parents – there are a lot of micro decisions. Hence, anything that can help enrich the decision-making process is always extremely valuable. Such is the approach we take and our outlook,” Dr. Al Hanai explained. The significance of such research expands to training and mentoring individuals on cutting-edge work, tools, and technologies, as well as critical thinking. “There are three components to our research project: the data, which is about collecting more diverse and representative data, training algorithms, which requires computational systems, and testing, evaluation and deployment – thus, once everything is built, [it is about finding] use cases to deploy these algorithms,” Dr. Al Hanai said. Ultimately, her goals entail improving some of the technological AI and machine learning developments and being a part of such advancements, while deploying more algorithms into the real world and

augmenting people’s activities.

“I would love to able to see these algorithms augment what medical doctors do, or other decision-makers engage in, in order to have a richer experience. Mentoring and training junior researchers is another wish, in order for them to conduct similar work in different contexts,” she concluded.

Director of the research laboratory for Computer Human Intelligence and Assistant Professor of Computer Engineering at New York University Abu Dhabi

AUGMENTING EXPERIENCES FOR THE COMMON GOOD AS ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) AND MACHINE LEARNING CONTINUE TO BREAK NEW GROUND IN THE WORLD, ONE EMIRATI SCIENTIST IS ADDING HER OWN PERSONAL TOUCH AFTER DEVELOPING A SYSTEM THAT CAN DETECT DEPRESSION IN A CONVERSATION.

Dr. Tuka Al Hanai Scopus H-index: 8 Google scholar H-index: 10 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1591-3908

Q&A WITH EMIRATES YOUNG SCIENTIST ABDULAZIZ FAHAD AHMAD ALRAEESI

HOW DID YOUR EXPERIENCE IN THE EMIRATES YOUNG SCIENTIST COMPETITION IMPACT OR INFLUENCE YOUR DECISION ABOUT WHAT TO STUDY AT UNIVERSITY?

There was a very high level of competition. Omar and I are looking forward to more challenges – we want to make right choices at university, even if they are difficult. What our win taught us, is that, as long as there is ambition, it can be achieved and we can do it.

WHAT EXCITES OR INTERESTS YOU ABOUT SCIENCE?

The most important thing that distinguishes humans from many other creatures is our mind. Refining the mind and using it properly leads to discovery. And with the progress of science, life becomes easier, society develops, and we benefit from one another, as it happened with our research to help grade 12 students in the Applied Technology High School.

IF YOU WERE TO SOLVE A GLOBAL PROBLEM TODAY, WHAT WOULD IT BE?

The problem that most students in the world face in studying is boredom and a dislike of the subject. This is a global problem that must be properly solved to give students more passion for learning. Education is very important for the future because if you do not go to university, you will not get a job, nor will you be able to positively contribute to the world.

CAN YOU NAME ONE LOCAL AND ONE INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIST WHOSE WORK YOU REALLY ADMIRE?

WHAT MESSAGE WOULD YOU GIVE YOUR FUTURE SELF IN 10 YEARS?

I would say always look at the top and do not give up the effort to achieve your ambition, no matter what difficulties you face. Move forward and work hard because a dream that is not acted on is just a fantasy, it cannot be reached.

The young student speaks about his love for the Arabic language and what motivated him to find ways to strengthen its adoption among youth.

NAME: Abdulaziz Fahad Ahmad AlRaeesi

AGE: 17

SCHOOL: Applied Technology High School in Fujairah

CATEGORY: Behavioral and Social Sciences

PRIZE: Emirates Young Scientist 2022 (the first place winner)

PROJECT TITLE:Applied Technology High School - Fujairah Students Reluctance to Study Arabic Grammar from the Viewpoint of Students and Teachers: Causes and Solutions

WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO PARTICIPATE IN THE EMIRATES YOUNG SCIENTIST COMPETITION IN 2022?

What stimulated Omar and I to participate in the competition is our love for the Arabic language.

HOW DID YOU SELECT YOUR EMIRATES YOUNG SCIENTIST PROJECT, AND WHAT WAS YOUR PROJECT ABOUT?

Our project is about the reluctance of grade 12 students at the Applied Technology High School in Fujairah towards studying Arabic grammar. They are not into Arabic grammar books, they are only focusing on subjects like mathematics and physics or other subjects, even though Arabic is an important subject in the educational process and in the

traditional and religious customs in the UAE. We wanted to find out why students are not interested in studying Arabic grammar and what we can do to bring students towards it. This was the main question in the research. HOW WERE YOU ABLE TO SOLVE THIS PROBLEM, AND WHAT WERE YOUR CONCLUSIONS?

After studying this problem, we saw that there are some techniques the teacher in the class should use. Like, a teacher does not have to lead a class in a rigorous way, he has to do something to bring passion to the students. Knowledge is gained by experience, so experiments in the school labs or classrooms will bring the students closer to the idea and make them more passionate about it.

HOW CAN WE GET MORE YOUNG STUDENTS IN THE UAE INTERESTED IN SCIENCE?

When we first registered for the competition, there were some who thought that a project focusing on Arabic and grammar would have no chance to compete with or win against engineering projects. But in fact, anything in any field deserves to win and be honoured as long as it is innovative, useful and leaves a prominent mark on students, teachers or people in general. It has to be useful. Our work, for example, was about making Arabic books more relatable to the students and helping them to identify with the local culture.

Locally, Ahmed Almheiri. He is one of the role models here in the UAE and he is one of a kind. He is very successful as a scientist, and he has made many contributions in the field of physics. Internationally, I do not think that there is another person who made such a qualitative leap in the world of technology as Steve Jobs. He was first to turn big computers into small, simple to use devices, like phones. So, he made a huge leap.

CAN YOU LIST THREE SKILLS THAT EVERY SCIENTIST SHOULD HAVE AND WHY?

First of all, perseverance because there is no path to success without overcoming obstacles. Secondly, creative thinking and innovation, because it is the base of every invention. And finally, curiosity, to learn more, because a person learns up until the last minute of their life.

Emirates Young Scientist Award

COACHING TIPS

DID YOU KNOW:

In Metaverse, Meta is building Horizon Workrooms, which are virtual meeting spaces where colleagues can work together from anywhere using VR as an avatar or dialing into the virtual room from computers by video call. This is proof that hybrid work is here to stay after the panedmic whereby there is an emerging need to support that shift with technology which brings people together.

Did you know that by using Web 3.0, the internet will understand data in a human-like manner and will ensure that the content you consume is more personalized. Websites will be able to automatically adjust to your device, location, and any accessibility needs you may have, and web apps will become far more receptive to your usage patterns. It will also employ AI and machine learning to translate what you type and understand what you say, whether through text, voice, or other media.

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EVENTS CALENDAR

SHARJAH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON PHYSICS OF ADVANCED MATERIALS (SICPAM)

WHEN 25-27 APRIL, 2023

WHERE UNIVERSITY OF SHARJAH (UOS)

ORGANIZER

UNIVERSITY OF SHARJAH, RESEARCH INSTITUTE OF SCIENTIFIC AND ENGINEERING, SNOC, SHARJAH ELECTRICITY & WATER AUTHORITY, SHARJAH BROADCASTING AUTHORITY

The program of the conference will include series of plenary talks given by wellknown and highly cited scientists from Europe, USA and Canada. The conference will cover scientific programs from wide range of advanced materials and topics with a focus on their technological applications. The conference will provide opportunities to exchange ideas and identify potential academic partners to establish collaborations with the University of Sharjah and other UAE based universities.

MBRU 2023 DENTAL SYMPOSIUM

WHEN 2 – 3 JUNE, 2023

WHERE MBRU, BLDG.14 DUBAI HEALTHCARE CITY

ORGANIZER

MOHAMMED BIN RASHID UNIVERSITY OF MEDICINE AND HEALTH SCIENCES

Calling all specialized individuals in the dentistry field to join the MBRU dental symposium that is hosting 2 intensive days of workshops to discuss Topics about Root Canal Fillings, Pediatric Dental Trauma, Interceptive Orthodontics, Removable Prosthodontics as well as hands-on workshops for contemporary endodontics, ABC of Functional Crown Lengthening, and All things stainless steel crowns in pediatric dentistry.

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, ROBOTS AND MECHANICAL ENGINEERING (ICAIRME)

WHEN 7-8 JUNE, 2023

WHERE AL AIN CITY

ORGANIZER

WORLD CONFERENCE ON SCIENCE ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY (WCSET)

The World Conference on Science Engineering and Technology (WCSET) is a series of worldwide conferences whereby people gather from different nations across the globe to share innovative ideas and find creative solutions in the field of Science, Engineering, and Technology. The next International Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Mechanical Engineering (ICAIRME) will be held in the UAE - Al Ain city, which will provide an opportunity for participating experts and researchers from various academic and industrial circles to exchange their experiences, present their research and innovative ideas, and discuss the latest studies and research in the field of artificial intelligence, robotics, automation, mechanical engineering, and other interdisciplinary fields of interest.

THE 7TH ICASE WORLD CONFERENCE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION

WHEN 27 – 30 MARCH, 2023

WHERE BRITISH UNIVERSITY, DUBAI ORGANIZER

THE BRITISH UNIVESITY IN DUBAI, ICASE, DUBAI ECONOMY AND TOURISM, AMITY UNIVERSITY DUBAI, ALEF EDUCATION, MATHEMATICS AND SCIENCE TEACHER ASSOCIATION

The three-day conference will be attended by policymakers, curriculum developers, university educators and primary and secondary STEM teachers who are aware of the latest developments in the field. Plus, visitors can also understand the perspective and benefits of STEM education, which they can implement in their institutions.

17TH IEEE STUDENT

WHEN 29 APRIL, 2023

WHERE MAIN BUILDING, AMERICAN UNIVERSITY OF SHARJAH ORGANIZER IEEE UAE SECTION

DAY

The IEEE UAE Student Day is an annual event organized to enhance the culture of competition among engineering students from the different UAE universities, recognizes outstanding achievements of IEEE student members, provides opportunities for UAE IEEE students to share their experiences, enhances the leadership qualities of IEEE students, and introduces the IEEE to the public.

NYUAD HACKATHON FOR SOCIAL GOOD IN THE ARAB WORLD: FOCUSING ON QUANTUM COMPUTING (QC)

WHEN APRIL 27 - MAY 1, 2023

WHERE NEW YORK UNIVERSITY ABU DHABI (NYUAD) CONFERENCE CENTER (A6) ORGANIZER NEW YORK UNIVERSITY ABU DHABI (NYUAD) AND TAMKEEN

The NYUAD Hackathon participants will learn about quantum computing and use quantum-based technologies while developing their own solutions and working in cross-disciplinary and diverse global teams. During the NYUAD hackathon, we will form cross-disciplinary global teams (5 students per team) building solutions to challenging problems we are facing today using Quantum Computing technologies.

March 2023

Published on behalf of the UAE Ministry of Education by the Department of Science, Technology, and Research.

The Innovation@UAE Magazine is free of charge.

Disclaimer: Online project information and links published in the current issue of the Innovation@UAE Magazine are correct when the publication goes to press. The UAE Ministry of Education cannot be held responsible for information which is out of date or websites that are no longer live. Neither the UAE Ministry of Education nor any person acting on its behalf is responsible for the use that may be made of the information contained in this publication, or for any errors that may remain in the texts, despite the care taken in preparing them. The technologies presented in this magazine may be covered by intellectual property rights.

The content contained within Innovation@UAE Magazine is by no means an exhaustive listing of all research taking place in the UAE’s accredited higher education institutes. Each issue of the magazine merely seeks to present some selected news and features relating to research and researchers based on proposals from their host institutes. The editorial team responsible for Innovation@UAE Magazine reserves the right to select ideas for news, features, profiles, and calendar items according to the topic timeliness, the availability of information, the cooperativeness of the involved researchers, and the available time and resources.

If you would like to suggest a news story, research feature, researcher profile, or calendar item for the next issue, please contact research@moe.gov.ae, and include in the email subject headline "Innovation@UAE Magazine suggestion."

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