February 18, 2008
The Little Country That Roared
Boston — Singapore may be one of the smallest countries in the world, but you wouldn’t know that from the size of its booth at the annual meeting here of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Aside from the booths for the association itself, Singapore had one of the largest pavilions, touting its outsized ambitions to become a scientific and technological powerhouse.
Representatives of the country’s Agency for Science, Technology, and Research were milling about at the meeting, trying to lure Western researchers to consider working in Singapore. At the same time, the booth was promoting the accomplishments of homegrown scientists, several of whom were speaking at the meeting.
As part of its bid to develop a strong science and technological base, the agency has over the past few years sponsored scholarships for nearly 800 Singaporeans to attend foreign graduate schools, mainly in the United States and Britain, said Choong Ket Che, director of corporate communications for the agency. “We need a whole pipeline of young talent,” she said. One of the people in that pipeline is Chen Naiyen, a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in computational and systems biology. Her scholarship from the science agency covers tuition, fees, and one trip back to Singapore a year, she said.
And if Ms. Chen gets homesick between those trips back, she can rely on plenty of support in Boston. Currently, there are some 40 other graduate students on similar scholarships from the science agency training at MIT and nearby institutions, she said.
In addition to the large booth, the agency took out a full-page advertisement on the inside cover of the program for the AAAS meeting, describing the burgeoning science opportunities there. “Singapore: The new global centre of scientific, medical and technological excellence,” proclaims the ad. Only Subaru had a more prominent ad, right on the back cover of the program.
For the AAAS, the large booth from Singapore was reason to celebrate. At a meeting on Sunday of the association’s governing council, Alan I. Leshner, the chief executive officer of AAAS, said that Singapore’s interest in investing in the meeting helps the association with its own goals of advancing science across the globe. “From the mission side, often, starting with an exhibit is way to forge relationship,” he said, noting that the Singapore delegation had taken the opportunity to meet with David Baltimore, the Nobel laureate and AAAS president.
Richard Monastersky | Posted on Monday February 18, 2008 | Permalink
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