ABU DHABI // Parents can play a role in promoting science education by accompanying their children to the Abu Dhabi Science Festival.
As he led officials on a tour of the festival grounds on Monday, Abu Dhabi Education Council director general Dr Ali Al Nuaimi encouraged visitors to make the science festival a family affair.
“I urge parents to come and participate with their kids,” said Dr Al Nuaimi. “We offer this festival to help kids pursue careers in science and technology but we also need families and parents to help us achieve this because they have a big influence on their kids’ future. Attending the festival with their parents will help both parents and kids love science and technology.”
Held under the patronage of Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, and organised by Adec, the sixth edition of the winter attraction coincides with UAE Innovation Week, which hosts science, technology, engineering and maths (Stem) activities across the country from November 20 to 26.
“Stem education is a priority in our education system,” said Dr Al Nuaimi. “This year’s festival shows an increase in the contribution of local entities, as 40 per cent of the content is local content. We also have the Edinburgh International Science Festival as our strategic partner to make sure that what we are offering here in the UAE is up to global standards.”
The number of festival activities is up to 67, an increase of 20 per cent compared to last year, and includes more drop-in workshops that don’t require preregistration.
The science festival is also being staged at the Al Ain Zoo.
“The capacity of this year’s festival has grown,” said Dr Al Nuaimi. “Last year, the festival welcomed 10,000 students and this year it will be 15,000 from both government and private schools.”
He also anticipated the public attendance to reach record numbers.
“Last year, over 110,000 people visited this festival, so this gives you an idea of how important it is and this year, we are expecting more people to come,” said Dr Al Nuaimi.
Dr Al Nuaimi’s first stop was the indoor theatre where neon lights cast a futurist glow inside the darkened room as a voice boomed over the speakers, “Who are you and what are you doing on my planet?”
The delegation then travelled through the nine zones where volunteers demonstrated some of the hands-on activities and challenges available to visitors.
At the Smartphone Microscope station, the officials observed as a science facilitator used a USB microscope to zoom in on the fibres of a piece of tweed fabric. Participants at this workshop also have the opportunity to build their own mobile phone microscopes using a cardboard box, a glass lens and pencil. Visitors will be encouraged to take home most of the gadgets they build.
In the Microplanes workshop, children be introduced to the science behind aviation as they build their own small airplane to launch.
“The content evolves around the interest of kids to inspire them to study science and technology,” said Dr Al Nuaimi. “This festival also helps students to connect what they see in the classroom with realistic experiments, so they can live the experience. It helps them realise the importance of science and why we need science in our lives. It allows them to be more creative. We need local scientific talent in our community. We want our kids to know the importance of science and technology and excel in these fields. This will help us build a knowledge based economy and compete globally.”
rpennington@thenational.ae
Bullet Train
Director: David Leitch
Stars: Brad Pitt, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Brian Tyree Henry, Sandra Bullock
Rating: 3/5
History's medical milestones
1799 - First small pox vaccine administered
1846 - First public demonstration of anaesthesia in surgery
1861 - Louis Pasteur published his germ theory which proved that bacteria caused diseases
1895 - Discovery of x-rays
1923 - Heart valve surgery performed successfully for first time
1928 - Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin
1953 - Structure of DNA discovered
1952 - First organ transplant - a kidney - takes place
1954 - Clinical trials of birth control pill
1979 - MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging, scanned used to diagnose illness and injury.
1998 - The first adult live-donor liver transplant is carried out
THE SWIMMERS
Director: Sally El-Hosaini
Stars: Nathalie Issa, Manal Issa, Ahmed Malek and Ali Suliman
Rating: 4/5
How Tesla’s price correction has hit fund managers
Investing in disruptive technology can be a bumpy ride, as investors in Tesla were reminded on Friday, when its stock dropped 7.5 per cent in early trading to $575.
It recovered slightly but still ended the week 15 per cent lower and is down a third from its all-time high of $883 on January 26. The electric car maker’s market cap fell from $834 billion to about $567bn in that time, a drop of an astonishing $267bn, and a blow for those who bought Tesla stock late.
The collapse also hit fund managers that have gone big on Tesla, notably the UK-based Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust and Cathie Wood’s ARK Innovation ETF.
Tesla is the top holding in both funds, making up a hefty 10 per cent of total assets under management. Both funds have fallen by a quarter in the past month.
Matt Weller, global head of market research at GAIN Capital, recently warned that Tesla founder Elon Musk had “flown a bit too close to the sun”, after getting carried away by investing $1.5bn of the company’s money in Bitcoin.
He also predicted Tesla’s sales could struggle as traditional auto manufacturers ramp up electric car production, destroying its first mover advantage.
AJ Bell’s Russ Mould warns that many investors buy tech stocks when earnings forecasts are rising, almost regardless of valuation. “When it works, it really works. But when it goes wrong, elevated valuations leave little or no downside protection.”
A Tesla correction was probably baked in after last year’s astonishing share price surge, and many investors will see this as an opportunity to load up at a reduced price.
Dramatic swings are to be expected when investing in disruptive technology, as Ms Wood at ARK makes clear.
Every week, she sends subscribers a commentary listing “stocks in our strategies that have appreciated or dropped more than 15 per cent in a day” during the week.
Her latest commentary, issued on Friday, showed seven stocks displaying extreme volatility, led by ExOne, a leader in binder jetting 3D printing technology. It jumped 24 per cent, boosted by news that fellow 3D printing specialist Stratasys had beaten fourth-quarter revenues and earnings expectations, seen as good news for the sector.
By contrast, computational drug and material discovery company Schrödinger fell 27 per cent after quarterly and full-year results showed its core software sales and drug development pipeline slowing.
Despite that setback, Ms Wood remains positive, arguing that its “medicinal chemistry platform offers a powerful and unique view into chemical space”.
In her weekly video view, she remains bullish, stating that: “We are on the right side of change, and disruptive innovation is going to deliver exponential growth trajectories for many of our companies, in fact, most of them.”
Ms Wood remains committed to Tesla as she expects global electric car sales to compound at an average annual rate of 82 per cent for the next five years.
She said these are so “enormous that some people find them unbelievable”, and argues that this scepticism, especially among institutional investors, “festers” and creates a great opportunity for ARK.
Only you can decide whether you are a believer or a festering sceptic. If it’s the former, then buckle up.
Kill Bill Volume 1
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Stars: Uma Thurman, David Carradine and Michael Madsen
Rating: 4.5/5
The Two Popes
Director: Fernando Meirelles
Stars: Anthony Hopkins, Jonathan Pryce
Four out of five stars
