Abu Dhabi research hub to set up propulsion centre to boost UAE space ambitions

Abu Dhabi's research and development centre is primed to deliver a major boost to the UAE's flourishing space programme.

The Advanced Technology Research Council is to set up a propulsion centre to help to put the nation on the fast track in the global space race.

The propulsion research centre will embrace advances in technology in an effort to make spacecraft go faster and further than before, as well as improve their fuel efficiency and carbon emissions.

The cutting-edge strategy aims to cement the Emirates' growing status as a leading player in the space sector.

The country has taken huge strides forward in recent years, from putting its first astronaut on the International Space Station to sending the historic Hope Probe on a successful journey to Mars in a first for the Arab world.

Nora Al Matrooshi, the first Arab female astronaut, speaks about her experience of being selected during Expo's Space Week. All photos: Expo 2020 Dubai
Maj Hazza Al Mansouri, the first Emirati in space, at Expo 2020 Dubai.
UAE astronauts Sultan Al Neyadi and Mohammed Al Mulla speak at Expo.
Maj Al Mansouri takes the stage during a Space Week panel session.

A mission to the Moon is set for lift-off next year while a long-term plan to explore the asteroid belt and complete a fly-by of Venus in 2028 is already taking shape.

Now the capital's nerve centre for future innovation hopes to steer its lofty ambitions to even greater heights.

“There was initial scepticism about the ability of a young entity to achieve what many established research hubs have been unable to do – attract global talent and patent breakthrough solutions right here to give the country greater autonomy in the advanced technology space,” said Faisal Al Bannai, secretary general of ATRC, at the opening of the research centre a little over a year ago.

Two other research centres will also be opened as part of a grand vision to drive the country's development for decades to come.

An alternative energy research centre will focus on water security and improving technology applications amid a growing push to convert utility grids to renewable energy.

And building on the UAE’s R&D capabilities in genetic engineering, biomaterials and autonomous devices, the new biotechnology research centre will focus on breakthroughs in health care, food and agriculture.

The state-of-the-art centre already has seven operating labs in areas such as quantum computing – where building of the Middle East's first quantum computer is under way – and cryptography.

Abu Dhabi's applied research initiatives are a critical part of the UAE's efforts to diversify from a reliance on oil exports and develop a knowledge-based economy.

Mr Al Bannai also told of plans to expand the ATRC's applied research pillar, the Technology Innovation Institute.

In its first year, TII's research centres signed 65 global partnership agreements with 37 universities, research centres and industrial stakeholders, and filed five patents, crucial to protecting new ideas and bringing them to market.

The centres employ 101 Emiratis associate researchers and scientists.

The advent of artificial intelligence, quantum computing and more sophisticated cyber security threats means that nations around the world are concerned with developing independent technology – and the UAE is no different.

Designs and innovation key to the progress of the country will be supported by VentureOne, the new commercial arm of the ATRC.

It will set out to ensure the country's best ideas become a reality by bringing them to market at speed while protecting intellectual property.

Mr Al Bannai said the ATRC's plans are in line with the UAE’s Principles of the 50 and Projects of the 50 initiatives, a series of programmes to boost economic growth and prepare the country for a rapidly changing future.

THE BIO

Age: 33

Favourite quote: “If you’re going through hell, keep going” Winston Churchill

Favourite breed of dog: All of them. I can’t possibly pick a favourite.

Favourite place in the UAE: The Stray Dogs Centre in Umm Al Quwain. It sounds predictable, but it honestly is my favourite place to spend time. Surrounded by hundreds of dogs that love you - what could possibly be better than that?

Favourite colour: All the colours that dogs come in

Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts

Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.

The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.

Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.

More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.

The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.

Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:

November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.

May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.

April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.

February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.

December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.

July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.

May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.

New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.