Singapore is Asia’s success story. It has a landmass just over twice that of Malta but produces over 30 times its economic output. Singapore has invested heavily in quantum technologies, turning itself into one of the world’s leading industrial economies. Though poor in natural resources, Singapore’s investment in knowledge has resulted in it becoming one of the world’s healthiest industrial economies.Continue reading
Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) is a neurodegenerative disease that causes motor neurons to deteriorate. These nerves are required for voluntary muscle activity control. Neuronal loss leads to progressive muscle weakness that makes it difficult for one to move and function normally. These devastating consequences make SMA the leading genetic killer of infants, who succumb to the effects of the condition within a few years.Continue reading
Every day in Malta, one person will die from a smoking-related illness. People usually begin smoking tobacco in their adolescence and addiction quickly follows. Quitting is hard and the majority are unsuccessful. Nicotine, with its crippling withdrawal symptoms, is to blame. Research suggests this component of tobacco can be more addictive than heroin. Smokers say that nicotine is pleasurable and enables them to concentrate and reduce their anxiety. Scientists think the opposite.Continue reading
The world has globalised. People and cargo need to get about in cheaper, faster ways that use better transport technologies. Magnetic levitation is one way to achieve higher speeds at a cheaper fuel cost whilst offering a smoother ride. There is less friction since the vehicle floats on electromagnetic waves that make this transport method very efficient.Continue reading
Automatic facial recognition could change the world of law enforcement. Profile photos of suspects are rarely available, so investigators still rely on face sketches based on eyewitness descriptions. Julia Farrugia (supervised by Dr Ing. Reuben Farrugia) implemented an automatic face recogniser that is able to retrieve a photo based on a sketch. This narrows down the number of potential criminals before trails start to go cold.Continue reading
Urban development in Malta has undergone an exponential growth in the past decades. This is a growth that has often been imposed indiscriminately within long-established and tightly knit streets, and worsened by a lack of urban design approaches by investors and politicians alike. The Maltese planning system has only reacted to economic and market conditions instead of trying to foresee them, and consecutive governments have simply sought to stimulate the construction industry further. In addition, none of the policies produced by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority (MEPA) have to date been urban design-oriented. The planning system has been overloaded with a plethora of policies that however fail to consider the street—arguably the most important spatial scale within the Maltese urban environment.Continue reading
