Formation of startups and new companies
Commercial exploitation of science, technology, and novelty
System of laws, regulations, strategies, and funding priorities
Discovery and creation of new knowledge of the natural world
Technological Advancements in the world.
By: Maheen Hasan, Editor - Muslim-Science.Com
Muslim-Science.Com has the pleasure of presenting to you, the first ever List of ‘Top-20 Most Influential Women in Science in the Islamic World’. These are truly the unsung and little known heroines of the Islamic World whose contribution to the development of science and innovation of the Islamic World is no less than any others…
Our list encompasses 20 Remarkable Women who have performed amazing feats during the course of their careers. These pertain to all five main regions of the Islamic World, namely, South East Asia, South and Central Asia, Gulf and Persia, Maghreb and North Africa, and North America and Europe and across at least 6 disciplines.
The list is divided into 3 Eras of Major Influence. These are:
The Pioneers (4 Scientists) - Period: Pre-1980 to 2000+
The Shapers (8 Scientists) - Period: 2000-2020+
The Emerging Champions (8 Scientists) - Period: 2020-2040+
Those on our list have been selected after a careful evaluation of relative achievements and accomplishments of these individuals. We have excluded some truly remarkable Royal Champions of Science in the Islamic World and attempted to focus on ordinary women who balance life with career and do justice to both.
Look out for individual profiles and achievements of these Women of Substance starting tomorrow. Join our facebook page (/Muslim-Science.Com) and twitter (@MuslimScience) to learn more about these amazing women.
Click here to download a low resolution image (500kb) of the Women in Science Infographic (here)
The names of Women on this list is:
By:Athar Osama
Published on SciDev.Net on 12 September 2012
Efforts to build innovation systems are too government-centric and tend to ignore a key ingredient — the private sector, says Athar Osama.
Recent years have seen a number of Islamic countries embarking on efforts to create and strengthen innovation ‘ecosystems’. But their delivery record has been mixed.
A couple of years ago, Malaysia created Agensi Inovasi Malaysia (AIM), under the Prime Minister’s office, to bridge the gaps in its innovation system. And plans are afoot in the United Arab Emirates to create an innovation agency to supplement or replace its Technology Development Co...
Growth of Science & Innovation in the Muslim World
By Marianne De Nazareth, Freelance Journalist - India
Published on OnIslam on 08 August 2012 00:00
When they return they get meager salaries, as low as $500 a month, so they are forced to take side jobs to survive.
We have a lot of stereotypes among of which is that Muslim women are repressed and do not get a chance to reach their full potential in their chosen fields, especially in the science fora. The session on the growth of science in the Islamic world, at the Euroscience Open Forum 2012 in Dublin, sounded intriguing and interesting for me as a a woman science journalist.
The topic being...
By: Tan Sri Dr. Omar Abdul Rahman
At the 34th convocation of UPM in October 2010 in my “ucapan balas” for the conferment of emeritus professorship of the university, I had suggested a defined new role for our public universities in line with current emphasis in national development. Because they are expected to, and in the position of contributing to the government’s socio-economic transformation program, I had suggested they be called transformational universities (TUs). What prompted me to do so was also the active discourse on the changing role of universities that has been going on for a number of years in academic circles in the West.
For example, during a...
By:Athar Osama
15 March 2012 | EN
The Muslim world and donors should use nongovernmental networks to nurture the dormant seeds of entrepreneurship, says Athar Osama.
Entrepreneurship and innovation may look like inherently Western ideas in the twenty-first century. Yet they have been part and parcel of Muslim societies even before the heyday of the earliest Islamic Empire.
Mecca, the birthplace of Islam, was long known as being on a major trade route in ancient Arabia. In later years, frontier cities of the rapidly expanding Islamic Empire became centres of commerce and learning, and it was at these meeting points of civilisations that scientific knowledge flo...
The Islamic world’s current science effort is on life support and without major ‘surgery’ could be yet another policy failure, says Athar Osama.
In 2007, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) created the Science, Technology and Innovation Organisation (STIO) to jumpstart science cooperation among its 57 member countries. Three years later, a founding meeting approved an annual budget of US$70 million, with four founding members — Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and and Syria — committing US$5 million each to the budget.
To date, 20 countries have joined STIO — but none has honoured its financial commitment, according to the organisatio...
By Zakri Abdul Hamid –
Science Adviser to the Prime Minister of Malaysia
For Malaysia, the past three decades have been a period of rapid and sustained growth. Measuring growth with the traditional Gross Domestic Product yardstick, Malaysia’s economy has increased more than a hundredfold. Over the past four decades, we have averaged nearly 7% annual growth. Poverty rates have fallen from 49%, to less than 4%. Per-capita GDP has risen from US$370, to more than US$9,000.
This growth has been matched by a fundamental change in the structure of our economy. Like many Asian countries, we have moved from a basis of agriculture and raw commodities to a multi-sector eco...
By: Dr. Athar Osama
Muslim-Science.Com met with Tan Sri Dr. Omar Abdur Rahman, Mahathir’s Science Advisor for over a decade and half and, the “prime mover” behind Mahathir Mohammed’s vision of a Knowledge-driven Malaysia. A deeply humble man, Tan Sri Omar insists that Mahathir was a science policymaker par excellence in his own right and that he would hardly have needed a science advisor. However, he played a critical role in providing scientific credibility to Mahathir’s plans and helping the Prime Minister reach out to the scientific community to build support for his policies.
As Malaysia’s first and longest serving Science Advisor – a position t...
