Why do banana-flavoured sweets taste differently from real bananas?

Alexanderhili

The flavour profile of banana sweets was created using the Gros Michel banana. This variety was the original reference banana flavour. In the 50s the fungal Panama disease wiped it out.

Why did the Gros Michel banana fall prey to disease? Well, commercial bananas are clones­—identical copies to one another—so when a disease infects one banana it can quickly spread throughout plantations. Couple that to a globalised world and the fungal infection spread like wildfire. With no resistance and time to adapt, this banana variety was doomed.

The Cavendish banana was introduced to meet commercial demands. Unfortunately for us, this banana is a bit bland. The superior taste of the Gros Michel banana was relegated to artificial flavours leaving us with a hint of the original banana taste.

Algae Farm

Alexander Hili

What is Malta’s most abundant resource? The sea and sun. Till now very few uses have been found for such resources due to the lack of applications in conventional industries. However, what would happen if we became unconventional?

Think Algae farms. Malta and Gozo could be using the warm waters around them to produce a cheap, healthy food. With copious sunlight prevalent throughout the year, local sushi bars could serve sushi wrapped in local nori. Malta could export to large profitable markets overseas. The farms could provide a large influx of work and increase cash flow to the Maltese Islands.

Pathfinders: The Golden Age of Arabic Science

Book Review

This book was published in 2010 but unfortunately remains one of the few examples of positivity towards Islam coming from the West. British Jim Al-Khalili was born in Iran and he wrote about science during the early days of Islam, also giving a beautiful picture of life before the Islamic revolution of 1979 that forced his family to flee. Al-Khalili is a an accomplished theoretical physicist and broadcast presenter for BBC Horizon, The Big Bang, Tomorrow’s World and Science and Islam (the parallel TV series to this book).

If you love history, you will love this book as Al-Khalili goes into great depth—three whole chapters—to explain the circumstances that led to the golden age of science within Islam. The standard history of science texts usually paints the Islamic Empire (the scientific golden age was mostly from the 8th till 13th century) as being the great saviour of Greek texts having translated the works of Pythagoras, Aristotle, and other Greek scientists that then instigated the Renaissance in Europe when they were translated into Latin and other languages. Al-Khalili shows that these scholars were not mere translators but innovative in Mathematics, Astronomy, Medicine, Chemistry, and other fields. Scholars came from all major faiths.

Al-Khalili takes till Chapter Four to start detailing these scientific achievements. I would have preferred if these came sooner. He reveals facts such as that the zero was not invented by the Arabs but by the Indians, the Arabs simply used it to powerful effect. The Arabs pushed mathematics by leaps and bounds and Al-Khalili uses multiple chapters to outline them all. They invented decimal fractions, part-invented the decimal system, and invented proofs of mathematical equations through induction, using pages of equations to break down the initial equation and prove it absolutely, which is still the gold standard for modern mathematicians.

“He reveals facts such as that the zero was not invented by the Arabs but by the Indians, the Arabs simply used it to powerful effect”

He talks about the polymath al-Razi (854 AD–925 AD). Al-Razi lays claim to classifying substances according to their properties based on experimentation. He used experimentation to select the most hygienic site for Baghdad’s hospital, improved medical ethics and even accepted mentally ill patients (when concurrently the Christian world saw them as devil-possessed), distinguished between curable and incurable disease, clinical trials, and many other advances. His medical textbook al-Kitab al-Hawi fills 23 modern volumes, the largest in the Arab world.

Al-Khalili talks about plenty of other advances and scholars that are sure to surprise readers. The book can be slightly challenging for people to get through. Al-Khalili writes beautifully, clearly, but somewhat academically. If you’re interested in learning about a neglected part of the history of science, this book is for you.

I spoke to Al-Khalili back in 2010 about the TV series related to this book. His final words were that I had to bring his series to Malta. Words relevant then as they are now: a shining light on the possible positivity within Islam interpreted in the right way.

Think ICT in Health Care

Ivan Bartolo
Ivan Bartolo

I have been directly involved in ICT for over 30 years. The last 10 years have been all dedicated to ICT in health.

I have visited hospitals and health centres in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Italy. During the several health conferences I have attended, I met with people from practically every corner of the world. Their common denominator: no health system is sustainable unless ICT is perceived as an enabler to assist health providers deliver an improved and more efficient care service that governments can afford.”Malta shares this concern. The added pressure is its ageing population.

Q:How can ICT truly reduce the financial pressures on our Health Service and make it sustainable?

A:Malta needs to develop a culture where citizens realise their responsibility to monitor their own health and maintain their own online electronic medical record. This can be done through daily, weekly or monthly monitoring of vital signs such as blood pressure, weight and others. Studies prove that people using eMonitoring services take better care of their own health.

I urge the Ministry of Health to run a simple pilot project in Malta. It could be run amongst the diabetic community. The pilot project would include 1,000 people. 500 of them will use the standard glucose-monitoring device while the other 500 will use a personal, electronic glucose-monitoring device. Within three to six months the results will show the superiority of eMonitoring devices for patient care. These existing health tools can enable people to live healthier lives and stay away from our overburdened hospital. The key is to control a condition without depending on medicines.

Q:Length of stay in hospitals and outpatient visits can be reduced through eMonitoring devices. How?

A:How many patients remain in hospital after medical intervention to have their vital signs monitored? Using these devices patients can be discharged from Mater Dei sooner by being given an eMonitoring kit to monitor themselves from home. The data would be sent electronically to Mater Dei for doctors or clinicians to analyse. These devices could reduce the patient length of stay and make more beds available at Mater Dei translating into reduced costs and waiting lists. They could alleviate the number of outpatient visits that would reduce pressure on the infrastructure and workforce providing more time to increase care quality. Such devices provide an opportunity for every Maltese citizen to have an online electronic medical record that would be always available to clinicians and general practitioners.

My vision for the Maltese health service is one of empowerment. The patient will be enabled to take better care of him or herself and become more accountable, disciplined, and committed to self-healthcare in the same way someone is committed to their job or hobby.

Ivan Bartolo is the Chief Executive Officer of 6PM, a leading IT company delivering award-winning health care products. emCare, a subsidiary of 6PM, provides eMonitoring services. For more information visit www.6pmsolutions.com and www.emcare360.com

Science and Politics

DavidMagri

Think meets up with Dr David Magri to tell us more about how he is trying to help scientists and politicians to network. Evidence-based policies need the input of scientists from all fields and are the future for Malta’s policy makers to develop a better, richer, and happier Malta.

Q: In a small country like Malta were everyone knows each other, why do scientists and politicians need to network? 

A: Even in a small country like Malta, people do not know everybody. In particular, scientists and politicians are two groups of individuals with busy schedules and different priorities. Because of the inherent nature of their professions, these two groups have no natural reason to meet. Scientists spend a considerable amount of time in their office, laboratory, in meetings, out on fieldwork, and at conferences. Politicians spend a substantial amount of time in their office, in the House of Parliament, at meetings, events, and attending conferences. However, for the nation’s interests, science and research policy is important for future competitiveness with regards to technical skills and human resources. Parliamentarians and governments set the national priorities for research, but researchers need to meet these research objectives. Researchers have a better understanding of what is feasible and what resources are needed.

“Scientists and politicians are two groups of individuals with busy schedules and different priorities”

Q:How are you trying to get them to engage?

A: The Malta Chamber of Scientists has established Science in the House as a networking forum between scientists and parliamentarians. Under the auspices of the House of Representatives, Science in the House is also a poster exhibition highlighting some of the leading research conducted in Malta, particularly at the University of Malta. Now in its third year, the event continues to build momentum with greater participation every year. It takes place in the Presidential Palace in Valletta. This year a number of parliamentarians with science-related interests and backgrounds have been asked by personal invitation to attend the opening ceremonies of Science in the House.

Q:What is the role of Science in the House as part of Science in the City – European Researcher’s Night?

A: Science in the House is the opening ceremony for the Science in the City festival. During the weekend festival the Presidential Palace is open to the public in the evening. The poster exhibition is left on display for parliamentarians to view, and afterwards left on display over the Notte Bianca festival allowing the general public including students, parents, and tourists to view the exhibition. During the week an estimated 6,000 visitors viewed the exhibition last year. 

Part of Science in the City, Malta’s Science and Arts Festival

For more stories click here

The event is supported by the Malta Chamber of Scientists, the RIDT University Research Trust, the University of Malta and the House of Representatives. For more information see
www.mcs.org.mt/index.php/events and on www.scienceinthecity.org.mt

 

Smaller, Faster, and just as pretty

Video streaming uses a lot of  bandwidth. Internet service providers can either limit bandwidth or provide more. To bypass this problem newer encoders aim to compact video into smaller packages, to keep the same video quality but a smaller size. 

The problem is the variety of video devices available that range from mobiles, tablets, and high definition TVs. This diversity results in various different video transmissions being needed. To avoid encoding the same sequence several times and reduce the traffic over a network, video coding called H.264/Scalable Video Coding (SVC) was introduced. This type of video coding allows a single stream to encode for time, space, and quality. This technology saves bandwidth. SVC is expected to become the standard for Internet streaming. The only thing holding it back is the need for a complex encoder.

Kurt Abela
Kurt Abela

Kurt Abela (supervised by Dr Ing. Reuben Farrugia) proposed the use of a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) based encoder to speed up the encoder. The Block Motion Estimation (BME) module within SVC takes up the bulk of the total encoding time in standard H.264/AVC. Abela designed certain modules to be optimised for NVIDIA GPUs. Through an asynchronous programming model, the video encoder could be run simultaneously on the CPU (Computer Processing Unit) and GPU. By using this novel encoder, encoding was sped up at most 436x times, when compared to a reference model, with no loss in quality. The encoder was sped up even more with further improvements to allow real-time HD video encoding. 

This system is much cheaper and easier to use than leading alternatives. GPUs are very cheap and already found in most computers. Further developments on GPUs could soon see them replace more expensive encoders in datacentres.

This research was performed as part of a Masters of Science in Information and Communication Technology at the Faculty of Information and Communication Technology, University of Malta. The research is partially funded by the Strategic Educational Pathways Scholarship Scheme (Malta). The scholarship is part-financed by the European Union—European Social Fund, under Operational Programme II—Cohesion Policy 2007–2013, ‘Empowering People for More Jobs and a Better Quality of Life’.

Maltese Olives and their genes

The olive tree (Olea europaea L.) is one of the oldest species of domesticated trees and the second most important oil fruit crop cultivated worldwide. 97% of the global olive cultivation is concentrated in the Mediterranean Basin. The olive thrives in Maltese soils. Economically, olives are not important for local agriculture, but its cultivation is becoming popular since the Maltese agribusiness has a lot of room for growth to make high quality oil and secondary products. 

Bajda-fruit4-RecoveredIn the Mediterranean region there are two subspecies of Olive tree. These are the wild olive (O. europaea L. subsp. Oleaster) and the cultivated olive (O. europaea L. subsp. Sativa). Each subspecies has several cultivars selected for taste, size, disease resistance or other desirable qualities. There are 1,300 cultivars worldwide and Malta is no exception. The Maltija cultivar is probably the most popular Maltese cultivar and can give a high productivity. The Bidnija cultivar, which is believed to be the oldest Maltese olive cultivar (it is thought to date back to Roman times), produces oil of excellent quality rich in polyphenols (these have many health benefits), exhibits high tolerance to environmental stress such as salinity and drought, and demonstrates resistance to pathogens and pests such as the olive fruit fly. The Bajda variety produces a characteristic white drupe. Besides the native cultivars, there are a number of Maltese wild olives. 

Renowned foreign varieties associated with high productivity tend to have a higher productivity than local cultivars. For this reason, local farmers find foreign varieties more convenient, leaving Malta at risk of forever losing its unique olives.

Till now revival efforts focus on artificial propagation and re-plantation. These trees are identified by their appearance. This is an inaccurate method since olive growth is influenced by environmental conditions.Bidni-fruit-+-leaves

To develop a better way to identify local cultivars, Oriana Mazzitelli (supervised by Dr Marion Zammit Mangion) has focused on adopting a genetic approach. She also wanted to examine the genetic diversity of Maltese olive varieties. Mazzitelli compared the genetic patterns of local varieties to those generated by two commercial Italian (Carolea) and Tunisian varieties (Chemlali). The genetic analysis produced unique DNA profiles that can provide a more accurate means of identification than just looking at the plant.

The genetic variability between varieties was high. The Bidnija and Maltija stood out for their genetic uniqueness. The differences between local varieties suggest that, despite being allegedly native, the origins of the two are not directly linked. A number of DNA marker regions detected in the foreign cultivars and in the Maltese wild olive were undetected in the Maltese cultivars, suggesting that not all DNA markers are present and amplifiable in foreign varieties have been conserved in the Maltese cultivars. Mazzitelli’s work is an important first step to show that local varieties can be identified cheaply through DNA analysis. Without genetic identification, maintaining and cultivating local varieties would be near impossible—a case of genes for good olive oil.

 

This research is part of a Master of Science in Biochemistry at the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery, University of Malta. The research was funded by STEPS (Strategic Educational Pathways) scholarship which is part-financed by the EU’s European Social Fund (ESF) under Operational Programme II—Cohesion Policy 2007-2013, ‘Empowering People for More Jobs and a Better Quality of Life’.