Best of our wild blogs: 3 May 08

Cyrene Star is in the news!
on the singapore celebrates our reefs blog

The last of the Chek Jawa Guidebooks
should there be a new guidebook? on the wildfilms blog

Labrador Seagrass project comes to an end
and a new beginning as a new team takes over, while the seniors join TeamSeagrass on the labrador park blog

Coral spawning
more sexy coral photos on the urban forest blog

May Day outreach
on the art in the wetlands blog

Sunbird and spider
on the bird ecology blog

Encounter with a Collared Scops Owl
on the bird ecology blog

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A new star for Singapore: discovery of sea star

Discovery of large five-rayed sea star adds to marine biodiversity here
David J.W. Lane , Robin Ngiam & Ivan Tan, Straits Times 3 May 08;

SINGAPORE has a new star to call its own.

This large five-rayed sea star is not new to science, but it is a new and spectacular addition to Singapore's already substantial inventory of living stars.

Lacking a common name but known in the marine science world as Pentaceraster mammillatus, it is in the same family as the more familiar cushion star and the knobbly sea star, which are still quite common on Singapore's remaining reefs.
The 'mammillatus' part of the name refers to the rows of nipple-like protuberances that cover the surface of the animal and give it a studded or armoured appearance.

The sea star was first sighted early last month on a seagrass monitoring trip at Cyrene reef, run by volunteer group TeamSeagrass and staff from the National Biodiversity Reference Centre of the National Parks Board (NParks).

The specimen baffled those who found it, all of whom had their own version of what to name the new find - which was at once familiar, yet strangely alien.

Names like 'Darth Vader star' and 'knobbly-wannabe' were bandied about as the group debated what it could possibly be.

Fast forward to a week ago: Armed with a permit, an enthusiastic search party made up of staff and students from the National University of Singapore's Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research, NParks and others - including visiting regional echinoderm specialist David Lane - set out for a dawn low-tide walk on Cyrene reef. (Echinoderms are marine animals that exhibit five-fold radial symmetry at some stage of life.)

Right at the end of the trip, as the tide was rising and time was running out, the object of the mission was located, almost hidden in a dense field of seagrass.

A rare and exciting find

THE discovery of this attractive species, one of about a dozen of its kind in the Indo-Pacific, is in some respects a remarkable surprise, given its large size and the fact that sea stars and their relatives had been intensively surveyed and studied throughout the 1990s by a team of NUS and Belgian marine scientists.

Another surprise is that this star was previously known to exist only in the western Indian Ocean and the Red Sea, so its presence in Singapore waters represents a considerable range increase.

It must be stated, however, that the taxonomy of this group has some uncertainties, with gradations between species, possible hybrids and a closely related form living in the Philippines region.

Nevertheless, the find is an important one in biodiversity terms.

The latest individual discovered, at 27cm in diameter, is smaller than the one seen previously, so a small population may exist in the dense seagrass of Cyrene, and possibly elsewhere locally.

Cyrene reef: Rich in marine life

SITTING in the midst of intensive port activities, not far from the huge container terminal of Pasir Panjang, this patch reef stands like a marine oasis - a trove of biodiversity in the midst of the nation's economic pulse.

This sandy reef, swept clean of silt by strong currents when the tide is in, is as rich now biologically, if not richer, than in the 1990s.

Recent and earlier treasure hunts have unearthed numerous species of sea stars, sand dollars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers, in addition to many other invertebrate species.

That all this marine life exists in the middle of one of the busiest port zones in the world attests to the cleanliness of the seawater environment. Marine life thrives where water currents are sufficient to prevent smothering by sedimentation.

Singapore owes its rich marine biodiversity heritage to the fact that it is equatorial, that it is close to the edge of the 'coral triangle' biodiversity hot spot of the Indo-Malay archipelago, and also to overlapping ranges of Pacific and Indian Ocean faunas.

The Republic is clearly at the centre of things in many ways.

Why is the continued existence of this kind of marine life in Singapore so important?

There is a host of reasons, many of which have to do with the quality of the marine environment and, directly or indirectly, with the quality of human life and the growing environmental awareness in crowded Singapore.

A rich diversity of marine life is often cited as a potential source of new medicinals or of target species for cultivation. An equally important value is that the continued existence - or otherwise - of rich and diverse marine communities provides an overall measure for monitoring the ecosystem and environmental health status.

Additionally, the recreational and educational value of natural resources and the environment will undoubtedly continue to grow in Singapore, as these resources become more and more scarce.

Unique to Cyrene is the fact that there are three different habitats - sea grass, coral reef and sand - amalgamated on one reef.

Other exotics, such as sea horses recently sighted there, are perhaps additional indicators of the conservation value of this reef formation.

An important objective in relation to this conservation issue would be an urgent survey programme for this new star, and other rarities, on the remaining untouched and relatively unexplored reef flats in the Southern Islands.

Dr Lane is a senior lecturer and marine scientist with Universiti Brunei Darussalam. Formerly with NUS, he continues to work closely with its Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research, the region's premier natural history museum. Mr Ngiam is a project officer with NParks, while Mr Tan is an education and public relations officer with the Raffles Museum.

Scanned from the print copy...
Learn more about Cyrene Reef!

• Come for Ria's talk today at 2pm on the "Secret Shores of Singapore" featuring Cyrene Reef
  
• Cyrene Reef: a special reef in Singapore's port on the singapore celebrates our reefs blog
• Join the "I want to go Cyrene!" facebook group
• Check out the Cyrene Blogging Carnival and the recent blog posts on Cyrene

Learn more about Singapore's sea stars

• Stars of Singapore on the singapore celebrates our reefs blog

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Does Singapore really need more people?

A city's size alone does not seem to result in economic growth or leadership
Richard Hartung, Today Online 3 May 08;

SINGAPORE'S population is too small to compete globally!

This constant refrain, tied to the concept that Singapore needs a rapidly growing population to sustain economic growth, seems to lie at the heart of the argument for increasing the population by millions.

The size of many cities at the forefront of innovation and economic growth in other locations, however, belies this need for a large population. Indeed, bringing in small numbers of the right people rather than just lots more workers, and focusing on creating the right environment for growth, may be more important.

Think about innovative cities around the world. In the United States, Silicon Valley immediately comes to mind. Not too far away, Seattle is the birthplace of Amazon, Microsoft and Starbucks. Around the world, top centres of innovation include cities such as Bangalore, Helsinki, Stockholm and Dublin.

It's true that the seven-million population in the Bay Area around Silicon Valley is larger than Singapore's, even though the population of the Valley itself is only about 2.5 million. Yet the populations of other centres of innovation and entrepreneurship are actually surprisingly small.

Seattle is at 3.4 million, Stockholm 1.9 million, Helsinki 1.3 million and Dublin 1.6 million. Bangalore's population of 5 to 6 million is admittedly larger than Singapore's, though not by much. Even when they are part of a larger country such as the US or India, economic development in these cities is local, and having a large population available in places such as Kansas or Kashmir doesn't enable innovation or growth in these cities.

One driver of growth is that these cities attract top talent from around the world. In Silicon Valley, about 35 per cent of the population is foreign-born and 17 per cent of Seattle's population is imported. In Bangalore, about half the population has migrated in from other cities in population-heavy India. Even Helsinki has the largest percentage of immigrants of any area in Finland. And it is not just numbers, as immigrants are usually more highly educated that the average population.

On the other hand, many of the world's largest cities certainly aren't recognised as centres of innovation and leaders in the competitive economy. The five largest cities in the world — Tokyo, Mumbai, Mexico City, Sao Paulo and New York — have populations between 17 and 28 million.

While it's true that Tokyo is known for adapting new technology well and New York is a financial capital, Mexico City or Sao Paulo may not top the global list for growth and innovation. Size alone therefore does not seem to result in economic growth or leadership.

If population size is not the key, then, what makes these cities thrive?

Mr Steve Poloz of Export Development Canada summarises the thoughts of many when he says that "today, the prime determinant for growth is whether a city is a catalyst for innovation. A city's rise or fall depends on how well it attracts the players — business, institutions, individuals — to interact, create and innovate."

What results in innovation? Leading author Richard Florida says in The Flight of the Creative Class that the drivers of innovation are the three Ts — talent, technology and tolerance. A nation that nurtures talent through education, develops technology with research funding and tolerates diversity such as women's rights or democracy or gays, he says, has a higher likelihood of attracting the human capital that will drive innovation and growth.

A city with the 3 Ts can have more innovation and higher growth than a city that just attracts lots of people.

Instead of size, then, developing a welcoming environment that nurtures talent and enables it to flourish seems more likely to drive growth than just population increases.

Two issues loom large for Singapore: First, Singapore may need to re-examine whether it has the right environment to attract talent, and how its environment is presented. A bourgeoning arts scene, allowing in same-sex partners and pouring money into research centres may help pave the road to success.

Yet, it is anecdotes such as censors banning movies and limited media freedom that attract attention. The image of the environment for one T — tolerance — could need improvement.

Second, attracting the right type of immigrants may be more important than sheer population growth alone. However, the people arriving to support the sectors currently driving growth here may not reflect the purported focus on talent development.

Even as research funding focuses on key strategic sectors, such as biotechnology and environment research, that epitomise talent development, the real engines of job growth are reported to be tourism, construction and marine engineering. Saying that high-end technology is central when lower-skilled jobs drive growth may make a second T — talent — seem suspect.

The successes of smaller, innovative cities indicate that population can be less important than other factors for driving economic growth. Instead, having all three Ts seems more central to success. Research funding initiatives show that technology in Singapore is here or on the way.

Enhancing the other two Ts — talent development for jobs that matter and a tolerant environment — to attract more talented people may be more important than sheer population numbers in driving growth higher.

The writer is a consultant who has lived in Singapore since 1992.

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Farming in Singapore: Best of everything possible

Reply from SLA and URA, Straits Times Forum 3 May 08;

WE REFER to the letter 'Capitalise on limited farmland' by Mr Anthony Leong Chee-Hong (April 22). As the writer correctly pointed out, Singapore cannot be entirely self-sufficient in food supply due to our limited land resources. Currently, local production accounts for 7 per cent of our leafy vegetable consumption, 15 per cent of our fish consumption and 30 per cent of our egg consumption.

This is achieved through the use of modern intensive farming technologies to maximise production and optimise land use. The Government will continue to allow farming as long as land is available and the private sector finds it commercially viable.

While our main objective is to make sure that identified agriculture uses are met, we also recognise that our farms can offer an additional recreational, food and beverage and educational experience to visitors, and at the same time supplement the farmers' income.

Opening up of farms to visitors should not be done at the expense of our limited farm land. Hence, public visitor amenities allowed within farms today are kept small scale so that they do not displace the primary agricultural functions of these farms.

In considering such proposals, we also ensure that they would not compromise food safety and animal and plant health. This approach allows us to optimise the use of our limited land resource and at the same time capitalise on the recreational and educational potential of farming activities.

Teo Jing Kok
Deputy Director, Lease Management & Sales
Land Operations Group
Singapore Land Authority


Lim Eng Hwee
Director (Physical Planning)
Urban Redevelopment Authority

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Saving rainforests: The bats have it, can we wing it?

Nicholas D. Kristof, New York Times Straits Times 3 May 08;

THE AMAZON JUNGLE (ECUADOR) - VAMPIRE bats are remarkably well-adapted to the rainforest. They come out at night and use heat sensors to find a goat, child or other mammal, which they feed upon only after determining from its breathing that it is asleep.

If the prey is an animal with fur, vampire bats use special teeth to shave the skin, with their incisors cutting the skin almost painlessly, while the saliva prevents clotting. They then lap up the blood.

So the question is: Can we humans adapt as effectively to the rainforest as vampire bats have?

It doesn't seem so. Instead of living in harmony with the rainforest - or only as parasitically as, say, a vampire bat - we're destroying the jungle in ways that contribute hugely to global warming.

Somewhere in the world, we humans cut down an area of jungle the size of a football field every second of every day, and deforestation now contributes as much to global warming as all the carbon emitted by the United States. By one calculation, four years of deforestation have the same carbon footprint as all flights in the history of aviation up until the year 2025.

That's the challenge that Mr Douglas McMeekin and Mr Juan Kunchikuy are trying to address. As I noted in my last column, they make an unusual pair: Mr McMeekin, 65, is an American businessman who came to Ecuador after going bankrupt at home in Kentucky, while Mr Kunchikuy, 30, is a naturalist and guide from an indigenous tribe who grew up in the rainforest with his blowgun and never wore shoes or knew electricity until he was 17.

They have joined forces to protect the rainforest by working with the locals, trying to create incentives for them to leave trees standing - while raising local living standards. 'Save the Rainforest' bumper stickers don't sustain local families, who earn an average of only US$300 (S$410) per year and see trees as a way to boost their incomes.

'People have to make a living,' Mr McMeekin said. 'But they can chop down 50 acres (20ha) of forest for a pasture, or they can earn the same income by chopping down five acres and planting cacao.'

So his organisation, Yachana Foundation, is distributing high-quality cacao seedlings to encourage farmers to manage small plots that leave most of the jungle intact. Yachana also operates a factory that buys the cacao and turns it into mail-order chocolate.

Yachana encourages family planning - to reduce population pressures that lead to deforestation - and runs a new private high school to train young people from throughout the Ecuadorian Amazon. The 120 students in the school get a superb education with English taught by American volunteers; the first graduation will be in July.

One aim is to build a core of indigenous leaders who can represent local views internationally and serve as agents of change within the region. Mr Kunchikuy - who speaks fluent English and serves on the board of Yachana Foundation - is a prototype. After all, there aren't many board members as comfortable with a microphone as with a blowgun (and who have scars on their noses from vampire bats).

The school focuses on practical skills, such as how to graft cacao or fruit-tree saplings, or how to operate fish ponds. The idea is to earn significant incomes without large clear-cuts.

Many students work part- time in the foundation's neighbouring eco-lodge, Yachana, which has 18 rooms catering to American tourists (and generates part of the cash to pay for the school).

As I walk through the jungle paths here, serenaded by the twittering of birds and monkeys above, or the splashing of turtles in the river, I marvel at this land. The Amazon is grand for putting us humans in our place - until you reach a clear-cut, and the spell breaks and you realise maybe we're not so puny after all.

One way to save the rainforests is to pay poor countries to preserve them. Research suggests that by paying these countries US$27.25 per tonne of carbon not emitted by destroying forests, the world could avoid US$85 in damage per tonne from the carbon.

But these can't just be deals with governments; too often we lose sight of the inhabitants of the forests. In a remote part of Central African Republic, I once found teams of Western volunteers dedicated to preserving gorillas - but there were no volunteers helping local Pygmies who were dying of malaria.

With Yachana, this partnership of a bankrupt American businessman and an Amazonian hunter, we have a model of how to help the forest by helping the people who live in it. Preserving the rainforest should be a priority, if we have a bat's brains.

NEW YORK TIMES

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Greenpeace welcomes move to save Indonesia's forests

Yahoo News 2 May 08;

Environment group Greenpeace on Friday welcomed Unilever's backing of a moratorium on palm oil deforestation in Indonesia, saying the move will help save forests in the sprawling archipelago.

The Anglo-Dutch food and consumer goods company announced Thursday it would aim to use only palm oil from fully traceable sources by 2015 in an effort to reduce the rapid despoiling of Indonesia's carbon-rich forests and peatlands.

"The writing is on the wall -- the pressure from the market will only increase as companies join this call for a moratorium on deforestation," Greenpeace advisor Arief Wicaksono said in a statement.

The multibillion-dollar company's support could also help put pressure on Indonesian authorities to place a moratorium on logging and the clearing of forests to make way for plantations.

High global prices for palm oil, which is used in goods from soap to biscuits and biodiesel, spurred deforestation in Indonesia, the world's largest crude palm oil producer.

Indonesia is the world's third-highest emitter of greenhouse gases, after the United States and China, mostly due to deforestation.

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China struggles to contain viral epidemic of HFMD

Channel NewsAsia 2 May 08;

BEIJING: Doctors in China struggled to contain the spread of an intestinal virus that has infected more than 3,300 children, killing 21 of them so far, state press reported Friday.

The latest death occurred in the city of Fuyang in Anhui province, the epicentre of the epidemic with 2,946 children infected there as of Friday, Xinhua news agency reported, citing local health officials.

The number of children in Anhui infected with the enterovirus 71, known as EV71, has risen by nearly 500 since Wednesday, the report said.

Up to 340 children have been infected in central Hubei province and five others are sick in the city of Hangzhou in eastern Zhejiang province, Xinhua reported.

Sixteen children have also fallen ill in Henan province, which borders Anhui.

EV71, which causes hand, foot and mouth disease, is highly contagious and is spread through direct contact with the mucus, saliva, or faeces of an infected person. Young children are most susceptible because of lower immune systems.

The disease begins with fever, blisters, mouth ulcers and rashes, and has spread in Anhui since early March, amid accusations by the Chinese media of a government-led cover-up of the epidemic.

Most of those stricken are under the age of six, with 879 children currently being treated in Fuyang hospitals, nine of whom are in critical condition, the report said. Forty others were in serious condition.

News of the epidemic only surfaced on Monday, when it was reported that 19 children had died.

State television showed video footage of parents from rural areas of Anhui bringing their toddlers to overcrowded hospitals in Fuyang.

Health officials warned that although older people may not show symptoms of the disease, they could be carriers of the virus and could possibly infect others, the report said.

"Fuyang city is strengthening medical emergency treatment and prevention and control measures in every way possible," Xinhua said, noting that treatment facilities would be expanded.

The World Health Organisation earlier this week expressed concern over the epidemic, which in serious cases can lead to brain, heart and lung damage.

It said in a statement Wednesday that while enteroviruses are found across the world, "the situation (in Anhui) is still of concern especially because of the current high reported case fatality rate compared to previous years."

China's health ministry has tried to calm fears, saying early discovery of the disease and better treatment has lowered the mortality rate, but has warned that the disease was likely to spread.

"We estimate that the hand, foot and mouth disease (caused by EV71) in Fuyang city will still continue for some time, the number of cases will continue to increase, and serious and fatal cases might still continue to happen," the ministry said Wednesday.

- AFP/ms

More HFMD cases in next few months
Close schools to check spread of virus that has killed 21 children: WHO
Straits Times 3 May 08;

BEIJING - CASES of hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) are likely to increase until next month or July, said the World Health Organisation (WHO) as China reported one more death from the disease.

The latest death occurred in the city of Fuyang in eastern Anhui province, which has been the epicentre of an outbreak that has infected nearly 3,000 and killed at least 21 children, reported state media.

They were infected by a potentially deadly strain of intestinal virus known as Enterovirus 71, or EV71.

EV71, said the WHO, spreads more easily in the summer and autumn months in temperate climates such as eastern China.

The fatality rate from the outbreak in China declined to 0.2 per cent in the April 17-29 period, from 11 per cent between March 10 and 31, the WHO said in its statement.

EV71 can cause ulcers on the tongue and gums, and blisters on the palms, soles and buttocks.

Most children recover within four to six days, according to the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta.

In severe cases, it can lead to fatal swelling of the brain, or encephalitis.

General hygiene measures such as hand-washing can help prevent the spread of the disease for which there is no vaccine.

'It may be advisable to close childcare facilities and schools to reduce the intensity of transmission,' the WHO said, adding that travel or trade restrictions are unnecessary.

Kindergartens in Anhui's Fuyang city closed two days early for the May 1 holiday in China.

Officials have said that almost all of those infected were children under the age of six and most were under two.

Some 738 children have recovered and 702 are still hospitalised, 36 of them in serious condition, Xinhua said. It said that 1,017 children were being treated as outpatients.

Some children have been diagnosed with brain, heart and lung damage, the report said.

China's Hubei province, which borders Anhui, yesterday reported 340 HFMD cases this year, of which at least five were caused by EV71. There were no casualties in Hubei.

Singapore, which is also experiencing an HFMD outbreak, has reported more than 9,000 cases and closed dozens of pre-schools and child-care centres.

EV71 is responsible for one in five of the HFMD cases in Singapore.

The most serious outbreak of HFMD from EV71 occurred in Taiwan in 1998 when 78 children died and 405 others had severe neurological complications, the CDC said.

Taiwan reported 39 cases of severe EV71 infection up to March 7, compared with three cases in the same period last year, according to Hong Kong's Sunday Morning Post.

Vietnam also has seen a sharp increase in EV71 but no details were available, said WHO Western Pacific spokesman Peter Cordingley.

'It is not a notifiable disease and it happens in large parts of Asia. Normally it goes under our radar, but the China outbreak caught our attention because at least 20 children had died,' he told the Post.

BLOOMBERG

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Singapore and the grand challenges of engineering

Shobana Kesava, Straits Times 3 May 08;

Cheap solar power

It is clean, free and will never run out. Even the tiny fraction of the sun's rays which strike the earth provides 10,000 times as much power as all the commercial energy humans use on the planet.

But less than 1 per cent of energy needs are met by solar power, which is six times more expensive than conventional energy sources.

Solutions: Overcoming the barriers to widespread solar power generation will require engineering innovations in several arenas - in capturing the sun's energy, converting it to useful forms and storing it for use when the sun itself is obscured.

In Singapore: Norway's Renewable Energy Cooperation will build the world's largest solar manufacturing facility here. The National University of Singapore (NUS) has projects to use new materials like selenium or diamond to make efficient, cheaper solar cells. A Nanyang Technological University (NTU) team is finding ways to use the sun's rays to split water cheaply to produce hydrogen, a clean source of fuel. Another is trying to produce fuel by duplicating the plant's way of using sunlight to produce food.

Clean water

Lack of clean water is responsible for more deaths globally than wars. Nearly 5,000 children die from related diseases daily.

Solutions: Inexpensive ways to remove salt from seawater. Desalination is costly and consumes a lot of energy. A new approach might be to filter out salt with tiny tubes of carbon.

In Singapore: NUS is working with China's Beijing University and Britain's Oxford University to develop purification systems that use sunlight and microbes.

PUB is working with commercial enterprises to test new technologies at its facilities. NTU has just opened the Nanyang Environment and Water Research Institute to boost research.

A*Star's Institute of Microelectronics has developed a small electronic chip with biological markers to test and analyse water quality.

Understanding the brain

Specific skills like playing chess may have been mastered by thinking machines, but general-purpose artificial intelligence (AI) remains elusive. Engineers think understanding living brains may change the way artificial ones are made.

Solutions: AI is already behind speech, voice and vision recognition software.

Progress is being made in developing artificial retinas - light-sensitive chips that could restore vision - and neural prostheses - artificial aids to the nervous system that treat hearing loss and stimulate electrodes to treat Parkinson's disease. Implants to read the thoughts of immobilised patients could send signals to an external computer.

In Singapore: A*Star's Institute for Infocomm Research has developed a brain-computer interface (below) to build a direct channel between the two, by implanting an electrode in the brain to capture nerve signals.

Greenhouse gases

The issue of carbon dioxide (CO2) as the primary cause of global warming cannot be swept under the rug but could be vacuumed deep underground or within the ocean. Sequestration captures the gas and stores it safely away from the atmosphere, where it warms the earth's surface.

Already plentiful, but little known compared to CO2, is poisonous nitrous oxide (N2O), whose release has been escalated by human activity. This greenhouse gas is 200 times more of a heat trap than CO2. Agricultural fertiliser is the major source of N2O which reduces the earth's protective ozone layer, adds to smog, contributes to acid rain and contaminates drinking water.

Solutions: Industrial smokestacks could be replaced with absorption towers that isolate CO2 and return it to plants for re-use, or pipe it away for storage in depleted oil fields or use it to help pump up the remaining fuel.

Engineers need to find ways to trap CO2 deep enough underground, where pressure will compact it and keep it from diffusing back up, or send it into the ocean to combine chemically with calcium, locking it away as rock.

Instead of letting nitrogen leak into the atmosphere as dangerous N2O, it should be plugged and converted back into nitrogen, which can be trapped in plants as a protein-rich food source. This must be done cheaply so food costs do not rise.

Better medicines

Personalised medicine for individuals.

Solutions: Tools to rapidly assess a patient's genetic profile, trace the tiniest amount of chemical or virus in the body, and collect and manage massive amounts of data on individuals.

Also, therapies that treat drug-resistant infections by identifying the precise bacterium or virus causing an infection, instead of using general antibiotics.

In Singapore: Researchers in the billion-dollar pharmaceutical industry and Biopolis are working feverishly on solutions. Scientists at the Genome Institute of Singapore are studying the genetic underpinnings of cancer. NUS has scientists finding out how the building blocks of fats can protect cells.

Enhancing virtual reality

Virtual reality attempts to recreate the actual experience of activities such as flying a plane or conducting surgery.

Solutions: Precision in the virtual world, which falls short most when it comes to the sensation of touch. Surgeons cutting through vital tissue should feel different degrees of resistance to the motion of a scalpel at different places along the tissue. Virtual tourism of real places could be possible as sites like Google Earth merge with reality games such as Second Life.

In Singapore:
Firms have come up with systems that work well in the virtual world. First Meta, for example, has created a credit-line facility for the online community.

Securing cyberspace

Electronic information flow is embedded in networks of nearly every aspect of modern life. Cyberspace disruptions could cripple everything from traffic lights and aeroplane routes to cellphones and e-mail.

Solutions: Methods to monitor and quickly detect any security breach and prevent diversion or alteration. New programming languages and better approaches are needed to authenticate hardware, software and data in computer systems and verify user identities. Biometric technologies like fingerprint readers could be used.

In Singapore: Government, universities and commercial enterprises are racing to raise and redefine online security levels.

Technology of the future to be more personalised
That's common theme of 14 top engineering challenges listed by international panel
Shobana Kesava, Straits Times 3 May 08;

IN THE 21st century, health care, travel and information will be made personal.

People could have individualised power and water sources, and medicines could be tailor-made according to each individual's genetic code, for example.

This is the common theme of the 14 top engineering challenges of the century, set out this year by a team of international leaders, comprising scientists, entrepreneurs and thinkers.

Those on the team include leaders from the American National Academy of Engineering and American Academy of Science, technopreneur Ray Kurzweil, biologist Craig Venter, inventor Dean Kamen and Google co-founder Larry Page.

One of only two Asians in the group of 18 is the head of the Institute of Bio-engineering and Nanotechnology in Singapore, Professor Jackie Ying.

'We have a world today which a century ago was unimaginable,' she said.

Planes and spacecraft were once made for flights of fancy, while just 20 years ago, Singaporeans would not have foreseen the reliance placed on cellphones and e-mail.

Prof Ying said engineering genius will take sufficient brainpower and funding.

'What we want to do now is catch the imagination of young people.'

She said the group's choices fell under four themes essential for humanity to flourish: sustainability, health, reducing vulnerability and the joy of living.

To Prof Ying, the most urgent need is carbon sequestration - trapping and storing carbon dioxide, a major cause of global warming.

'All we need is a global change of two to four degrees and we could all be gone,' she said. 'Policy makers have to jump in on this.'

At her institute, leaps are being made in the field of personalised medicine.

However, work must be done to change the mentality of how the world views medicine: It must be seen as worth the investment to study highly effective treatments which may not work across the board, but help only small groups.

Visitors to the site www.engineeringchallenges.org can vote for challenges they feel should be prioritised.

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Should Singapore go for clean coal?

The Daedalus Column: Technological triumphs and challenges
Coal's a real power player
Andy Ho, Straits Times 3 May 08;

If or when CCS becomes commercially viable, should Singapore diversify into clean coal? Australia is the largest exporter of coal in the region, with Indonesia fast catching up, so stable supplies would seem to be assured.

If carbon emissions were our only concern, we should go with clean coal. But we would also have to be comfortable with the devastation that coal mining inflicts on the earth. If we were, we would be in good company.

LAST week, some members of the European Parliament started pushing for new financial incentives to jumpstart 'clean coal', or to turn the black stuff into clean gas.

Widely used technology to turn coal into gas can already remove 95 per cent of its sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and ash impurities - but not carbon. Coal produces double the amount of carbon emissions per unit of electricity generated compared to natural gas. Some people have proposed trapping deep underground the carbon dioxide created when coal is gasified.

If successful, this carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology would result in zero carbon emissions when gasified coal is burnt to generate electricity. But forcing carbon dioxide deep underground under very high pressure is unproven technology, at least on an industrial scale. Turning coal into gas is proven technology but the problem there is economic: Gasified coal is not as efficient as natural gas in generating power.

The most widely used coal-to-gas technology - pulverised fuel plants - can achieve only 45 per cent efficiency converting coal energy into electricity. By comparison, gas turbines are 60 per cent efficient - and 25 per cent cheaper.

So utility companies prefer conventional coal, which is 20 per cent cheaper than gasified coal. The cheapest fossil fuel around, there is enough of it to last two more centuries - and there is no coal cartel. The United States has 27 per cent of the world's known reserves while Russia has 17 per cent, China 13 per cent and India 10 per cent.

With petroleum and natural gas prices rising - fuel costs have risen 151 per cent since 1996 - electricity companies in Italy, Germany, Britain and the Czech Republic are currently building 50 new coal-fired power plants that will run for the next 50 years - with or without CCS.

If or when CCS becomes commercially viable, should Singapore diversify into clean coal? Australia is the largest exporter of coal in the region, with Indonesia fast catching up, so stable supplies would seem to be assured.

If carbon emissions were our only concern, we should go with clean coal. But we would also have to be comfortable with the devastation that coal mining inflicts on the earth. If we were, we would be in good company. An interdisciplinary report from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology last year - The Future Of Coal - focused on the carbon issue and did not delve into coal mining's assault on the land at all.

Forget about the shaft coal mines seen in movies, with legions of soot-smudged men wielding picks emerging from them. In the US, where half - as well as in Australia, where three-quarters - of power comes from coal, massive-scale, open-pit, surface mining for coal is now the norm.

This method uses 7,000-tonne excavating behemoths called draglines. Requiring just a few operators, these can gouge out 200 tonnes, or 10 truckloads, of soil at one go from the sides of a deep valley of their own making. In some cases, explosives and draglines are used to amputate mountain tops; bulldozers would then push the loosened earth (with coal) down into the valleys below. Such methods make some of the biggest holes in the world. In the past few decades, these super-mines have come to dominate the industry in the US and Australia. China is adopting them too.

Besides the land, coal mining hurts people too. The black lung disease that shaft miners suffer from is well known but even non-miners living near mines can be exposed to dust from surface mining, truck and train loading facilities, chemicals used in coal cleaning that are discharged into surface waters, and so on.

In April, the American Journal of Public Health published a study of non-mining residents in West Virginia counties where coal is heavily mined. It found that the residents suffered a 70 per cent higher risk of kidney disease, 64 per cent higher risk of lung disease and 30 per cent increased risk of hypertension.

Yet, the US continues down this self-destructive path. Boston University's business ethicist James Post reasons that Americans can't assess holistically the economic, energy, ecological and health impact of coal. Moreover, there is just no stopping so wealthy an industry with so powerful a lobby in Washington DC.

Professor Post, who teaches corporate accountability, explains: 'The politics of coal is very complex and intense as lots of jobs and profits are at stake. Much of King Coal's political clout is attributable to the venerable 90-

year-old Senator Robert Byrd from West Virginia, who has unparalleled influence in DC and is unyielding in his determination to create economic advantage for his constituents. His influence affects the way every other energy policy interest has to play the game.'

Symbolically, coal is not just the least expensive US domestic energy source, it is also to be preferred to 'foreign oil' or 'Middle East oil', says Prof Post.

The fear of foreign domination abounds even though the reality is globalised trade in commodities, products and services. Substantively, Senator Byrd's influence translates into the protection of coal interests and the obscuring of other important considerations such as health-care costs and environmental harm.

'Against this backdrop, a multitude of union interests and dependent industries like power utilities creates a lobbying force of great significance,' adds Prof Post. It's not only that laws to rein in the industry's wanton rape of the land cannot be passed, but also that federal funds cannot be channelled into projects to optimise coal gasification, perfect CCS technology and so on.

Of course, West Virginians are economically better off with, rather than without, coal mining, which is why Mr Byrd fights so hard to protect these interests. So opposing coal out of a sense of pique with the industry may be unproductive. After all, even with huge reserves of its own, China imports Australian coal, which releases more energy when burnt than its own soft coal. What this trade shows is that while coal mining might harm Queensland's ecology, say, it is good for both economies, Prof Post notes.

In other words, economics trumps ecology. Higher oil and gas prices are making coal very attractive for power generation not only in Europe but also in China and India. According to the International Energy Agency's World Energy Outlook 2007 report, the two Asian giants will account for 80 per cent of the increase in coal use up to 2030, when coal usage will be double today's level.

Should industrial-scale CCS eventually work, it could raise coal power prices by 40 to 90 per cent. Thus, the economic case for clean coal seems quite weak. So don't expect dramatic changes - unless carbon emission cuts were mandated in the US and China, the world's biggest emitters. Coal is really a power player.

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Rice prices overshadow Asean trade ministers' meeting

Business Times 3 May 08;

(NUSA DUA, Indonesia) South-east Asian trade ministers met yesterday for talks on how to respond to soaring rice prices, after US President George W Bush proposed US$770 million in new US food aid to stave off a global food crisis.

The weekend gathering of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) on the resort island of Bali, famed for its shimmering green rice terraces, also discussed efforts to build momentum for long-delayed world trade talks.

'Our minister will talk about the rice price. We share the general concern,' said an official from the Philippines, which is the world's top rice importer, buying about 10 per cent of its annual needs from overseas.

Asian rice prices have almost trebled this year and prices on the Chicago Board of Trade have risen more than 80 per cent.

Mr Bush, expressing concern as rocketing world food prices intensified unrest in poor countries, promised on Thursday that the US would take the lead as hunger takes hold of a greater swathe of the developing world.

'With the new international funding I'm announcing . . . we're sending a clear message to the world that America will lead the fight against hunger for years to come,' Mr Bush said.

The World Food Programme issued an emergency appeal in late February for an extra US$500 million to help feed 73 million hungry people in 80 countries. Last month, a spokeswoman said that soaring rice prices has pushed the emergency appeal to US$756 million.

At the Bali talks, which conclude tomorrow and also involved representatives from Australia, New Zealand, India and the US, Malaysian Trade Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said that he would press for the 'hot topic' of food security to be higher on the agenda.

'It is about how Asean countries could cooperate to use their resources,' he told reporters, adding that Malaysia intended to raise its food production to reduce imports but that it could take his nation 10 years to be self sufficient in rice.

The world's biggest rice exporter, Thailand, is also at the Bali meeting of Asean economic ministers and an official from its delegation said that the seller's perspective should also be heard.

'The cost for producers, such as fertiliser, is going up. Everything is going up,' said the official.

With only 30 million tonnes traded annually, government export curbs, such as those from India and Vietnam, have spooked importers, such as the Philippines and Bangladesh, at a time when global stocks have halved from a record high in 2001.

Media reports quoted Indian Commerce Minister Kamal Nath, who was also due to attend the meeting, as saying that rice exporters such as India, Thailand and Vietnam had a key role and would support Bangkok convening a 'rice summit', without elaborating.

An Indian official in Bali confirmed that New Delhi had floated the idea, but doubted that it would be brought up at this meeting.

A Thai trade official, who declined to be named, sought to soothe concerns about a further rise in rice prices, reaffirming the country's policy not to curb rice exports.

'Thailand's policy remains the same. We don't have any problem over the supply of rice,' he said. -- Reuters

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ADB to meet amid food crisis, growing poverty

Channel NewsAsia 2 May 08;

MANILA : The Asian Development Bank holds its annual meeting this weekend reeling from a global food crisis that has led to stinging criticism of its international governors for failing to see it coming.

The soaring price of basic foods such as rice -- the benchmark Thai variety now fetches some 1,000 dollars a tonne, up threefold on a year ago -- has led to a supply crunch that is worrying governments wary of popular unrest.

There are other tough issues facing the bank, notably a simmering internal row among its members over its continuing relevance in a region that has been transformed since the lender was founded 42 years ago.

The United States, which with Japan is the ADB's largest shareholder, took the unprecedented recent step of voting against its long-term strategic plan, which is also on the agenda for the meeting in Spain's capital Madrid.

But a source within the bank, who asked not to be named, said: "While the bank faces a number of critical issues about its role and relevance, all this may be overshadowed by the food crisis."

ADB president Haruhiko Kuroda warned recently that soaring food prices had pushed back Asia's fight against poverty, and that some countries may one day need foreign aid to feed their hungry.

The rises are blamed on higher energy and fertiliser costs, greater global demand, droughts, the loss of rice farmland to biofuel plantations and price speculation.

"The food crisis did not happen overnight," said Shalmali Guttal, a senior associate at Focus on the Global South, a Bangkok-based political and economic advocacy group.

"Asian farmers have been drawing attention to the growing agrarian crisis for years, but no one with the power to change policy listened," she told AFP in a telephone interview.

"Many of us civil society researchers and activists saw this crisis coming, why didn't the ADB and the World Bank?"

While the ADB boasts some "spectacular progress" over the last 40 years in poverty reduction, most notably in China, the region is still home to some 600 million people living on less than a dollar a day -- two thirds of the global population.

"Agriculture has clearly been neglected by governments and international institutions alike for at least two decades and the world is now suffering the results of such neglect," Bruce Tolentino, director for economic reform and development with the Asia Foundation, told AFP.

He said the ADB and others "should have seen this crisis coming."

"But unfortunately it is a weakness common to many institutions, including the ADB, that the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing and vice versa."

Based in Manila, the ADB is owned by its 67 member countries -- 48 from the Asia-Pacific region, and 19 from elsewhere around the world.

In 2007, it approved 10.1 billion dollars of loans, 673 million dollars in grant projects, and technical assistance amounting to 243 million.

Since it was established, the ADB has grown from helping Asian governments develop infrastructure projects to promoting the role of the private sector in development.

But some critics say its loan conditions unfairly pressure governments to deregulate and privatize agriculture -- leading to problems such as the rice supply crunch.

Arze Glipo, the convenor of the Asia Pacific Network on Food Sovereignty, which represents farmers' groups, said ADB projects "tended to weaken farmers' livelihood."

She cited a 175-million-dollar loan to the Philippines to finance a grain sector development programme, under which the ADB urged the privatization of the National Food Authority.

The ADB also wanted restrictions on rice imports replaced with a system of tariffs, and cancelled the loan when Manila failed to act, she charged.

That kind of tactic -- "regardless of its costs and consequences" -- is at the very heart of the problem, said Guttal of Focus on the Global South, as it forced governments to change policies to fit in with the ADB's conditions for credits.

"The new policies favour large, mostly foreign, private sector actors and corporations and not the poor," she added.

- AFP/ir

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Cooking oil prices on the boil

Prices up by as much as 56%; failed crops and competition from biofuels blamed
Jessica Lim & Esther Tan, Straits Times 3 May 08;

WHILE rice has grabbed the headlines, the price of cooking oil has also been on a steady march north, driven by failed crops and competition from new-age biofuels.

In the last two months, retail prices have jumped between 9per cent and 56 per cent, depending on the brand, according to a survey released yesterday by the Consumers Association of Singapore (Case).

The cheapest oil available to consumers at major supermarkets here is the Cabbage brand of vegetable oil at $4.90 per 2kg bottle.

But even this is up from $4.50 in March. Its Knife brand counterpart - a premium brand - costs almost twice as much, according to the Case study, which was based on checks at eight supermarkets.

The association's survey is the first on monthly food prices and will be published on its website, www.case.org.sg.

Rising retail prices reflect a global trend in increased edible- oil prices, say importers.

They have seen prices more than double in the last three years. A tonne of refined liquid palm oil - the industry benchmark - costs US$1,200 (S$1,630), up from about US$450 in 2005.

Recent reports show that global edible oil prices rose 15 per cent in the first two months of this year.

The price increases have been driven by decreased crop yields due to climate change and competition from biofuels, which are made from the same plant extracts.

Said Mr Wong Mong Hong, deputy president of the Food Manufacturers Association: 'I have been in the industry for 38 years and this is the second time prices have been this high. The last time was in 1982 when there was a palm-oil shortage. This time, biofuels are the culprit.'

He said about 12 per cent of cooking oil produced by the world is now being directed to biofuels, a much-touted and clean-burning alternative to fossil fuels.

Demand for biofuels is expected to expand by almost 20per cent per year through 2011 despite recent concerns about their impact on the environment and world food supplies.

Price-conscious consumers 'can get around the price hike', said Case president Yeo Guat Kwang, by 'looking at their budget and comparing prices at different supermarkets'.

He said: 'Vegetable oil is among the cheapest kind of oil, while other types of oil, like sunflower oil and canola oil, are more expensive.'

However, vegetable oil, popular with hawkers, is still prone to wild jumps.

Said Mr Wong Shu Kiat, 43, owner of a coffee shop in Serangoon: 'Prices have fluctuated from about $10 to about $40 these three months. It cannot be helped. What matters is business must be good.'

Mr Chen Kern Wuan, president of the Newton Hawker Centre Stallholders Association, said hawkers usually refrain from changing the types of oil they use. But they may soon have to.

Mr Chen added: 'We will think of switching types of oil if things get worse, but we try not to do that because the taste of our food might change.'

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Small ethanol plants key to efficiency: Canada

Randall Palmer, Reuters 2 May 08;

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Building more and smaller ethanol plants could help overcome concerns that production of the biofuel consumes more in energy than it provides, Canadian Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz said on Friday.

One of the reasons so much energy is used to make ethanol is that trucks travel long distances carrying corn, chaff or other plant material to ethanol plants.

"Smaller and locally owned I think are the right way to go," Ritz said as he kicked off debate in the House of Commons on the final stage of a bill that would ensure that gasoline contains 5 percent ethanol by 2010.

Dennis Bevington of the opposition New Democratic Party said one study showed that ethanol made from Canadian corn would lead to a net reduction of only 21 percent in greenhouse gases compared with the use of gasoline.

If the corn actually had to be imported from the United States to make ethanol, it would actually lead to a net increase in emissions of the greenhouse gases blamed for climate change.

The Conservative government is proceeding with plans to mandate more ethanol use despite questions that have been raised both about ethanol's efficiency and about whether it would contribute to rising food costs.

The opposition Liberals and Bloc Quebecois both voted in favor of the government legislation at an intermediate stage on Thursday, leaving the smaller New Democratic Party as the only opponent.

Ritz said farmers were able to increase food production at the same time as boosting ethanol output.

"Due to the innovation and industriousness of Canadian agriculture and Canadian forestry, we have the capacity to do this and in no way affect our food lines," he said.

"A lot of people say we cannot do both. They say we cannot grow food for energy and for consumption. Nothing could be further from the truth. Anyone who has analyzed food production in this country knows that we are growing more, that it is better quality, and that it is safer."

He also said there were many factors behind higher food prices unrelated to the production of biofuels. Among them is the increased meat consumption by emerging middle classes in India and China, Ritz said.

The government's biofuel bill faces one more vote in the House. It will then move to the Senate, dominated by the Liberal Party, which has lent its support to the measure.

In addition to ethanol in gasoline, the bill will also provide for diesel to contain 2 percent renewable fuels by 2012.

(Editing by Rob Wilson)

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Major Arctic sea ice melt is expected this summer

Randoph E. Schmid, Associated Press Yahoo News 2 May 08;

The Arctic will remain on thinning ice, and climate warming is expected to begin affecting the Antarctic also, scientists said Friday.

"The long-term prognosis is not very optimistic," atmospheric scientist Jennifer Francis of Rutgers University said at a briefing.

Last summer sea ice in the North shrank to a record low, a change many attribute to global warming.

But while solar radiation and amounts of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are similar at the poles, to date the regions have responded differently, with little change in the South, explained oceanographer James Overland of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

What researchers have concluded was happening, was that in the North, global warming and natural variability of climate were reinforcing one another, sending the Arctic into a new state with much less sea ice than in the past.

"And there is very little chance for the climate to return to the conditions of 20 years ago," he added.

On the other hand, Overland explained, the ozone hole in the Antarctic masked conditions there, keeping temperatures low in most of the continent other than the peninsula reaching toward South America.

"So there is a scientific reason for why we're not seeing large changes in the Antarctic like we're seeing in the Arctic," he said.

But, Overland added, as the ozone hole recovers in coming years, global warming will begin to affect the South Pole also.

The briefing covered data being reported in a paper scheduled for publication next week in Eos, a journal of the American Geophysical Union.

Overland said he used to be among those skeptical about the effects of global climate change. The new findings, which he termed "startling," were developed at a recent workshop, he said.

There is agreement between weather observations, the output of computer climate models and scientific expectations for what should happen, added Francis.

All the evidence points toward human-made changes at both poles, she said, a conclusion that "further depletes the arsenals of those who insist that human-caused climate change is nothing to worry about."

Climatologist Gareth Marshall of the British Antarctic Survey said that while the term global warming is widely used, things are more complicated at the regional level.

In the Antarctic, he explained, climate change strengthened winds blowing around the continent, helping trap colder air. But that will decrease in the future, allowing warmer conditions to begin, he said.

And, Marshall added, all studies now show that human activities are the drivers of climate change in the Antarctic.

Asked if this summer will match last year's record low sea ice in the North, Overland that is likely.

"The tea leaves point to a minimal amount of sea ice next September, that would be the same as we had last summer, 40 percent loss compared to 20 years ago," he said. Overland added that the winter freeze got a late start last fall.

Francis added: "Over this entire fall, winter and right up 'till today the ice concentration, the amount of ice that's floating around on the Arctic, has been below normal every single day."

"All arrows are pointing towards, certainly not a recovery, something like we had last summer and possibly worse," she said.

Climate change warms Arctic, cools Antarctica
Deborah Zabarenko, Reuters 2 May 08;

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Arctic and Antarctica are poles apart when it comes to the effects of human-fueled climate change, scientists said on Friday: in the north, it is melting sea ice, but in the south, it powers winds that chill things down.

The North and South poles are both subject to solar radiation and rising levels of climate-warming greenhouse gases, the researchers said in a telephone briefing. But Antarctica is also affected by an ozone hole hovering high above it during the austral summer.

"All the evidence points toward human-made effects playing a major role in the changes that we see at both poles and evidence that contradicts this is very hard to find," said Jennifer Francis, an atmospheric scientist at Rutgers University in New Jersey.

An examination of many previous studies about polar climate, to be published May 6 in the journal Eos, "further depletes the arsenal of those who insist that human-caused climate change is nothing to worry about," Francis said in a telephone briefing.

In the Arctic, Francis and co-authors of the research said, warming spurred by human-generated carbon dioxide emissions has combined with natural climate variations to create a "perfect Arctic storm" that caused a dramatic disappearance of sea ice last year, a trend likely to continue.

'NEW STATE'

"Natural climate variability and global warming were actually working together and they've sent the Arctic into a new state for the climate that has much less sea ice," said James Overland, an oceanographer at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "There's very little chance for the climate to return to the conditions of 20 years ago."

In Antarctica, the ozone hole adds a new factor to an already complicated set of weather patterns, according to Gareth Marshall of the British Antarctic Survey.

The changes in air pressure that go along with depleted stratospheric ozone are responsible for an increase in the westerly winds that whip around the Southern Ocean, at latitudes a bit north of most of Antarctica.

These winds isolate much of the southern continent from some of the impact of global warming, Marshall said. The exception is the Antarctic Peninsula, which reaches northward toward South America. There, the effects of warming have been dramatic, he said, because the winds that protect the rest of Antarctica do not insulate the peninsula.

The stratospheric ozone hole, caused by the ozone-depleting release of chemicals found in refrigerants and hair sprays, is likely to fully recover by 2070 as less of these chemicals are in use, as a result of international agreements.

The ozone layer shields Earth from harmful solar radiation, but its recovery is likely to open the way for warming in central Antarctica, the scientists said.

(Editing by Patricia Zengerle)

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