Latest news with #Basit
Al Etihad
22-05-2025
- Health
- Al Etihad
NYUAD showcases cutting-edge innovations - all made in the Emirates
23 May 2025 00:45 MAYS IBRAHIM (ABU DHABI)New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) showcased a suite of homegrown innovations at Make it in the Emirates in Abu Dhabi, including brain-controlled prosthetics, one-of-a-kind UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles), and sustainable building materials. Mind-Controlled Prosthetics for Neurodegenerative ConditionsSpeaking with Aletihad, Abdul Basit, a research engineer at NYUAD, explained how a brain-controlled prosthetic arm developed at the university's eBRAIN Lab works. Using EEG (electroencephalogram) signals collected through electrodes placed on the scalp, the team is developing AI-driven systems that interpret brain activity and translate it into precise movements in a robotic arm. "This technology is primarily aimed at patients suffering from ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) and MS (Multiple Sclerosis), paralysis or other neurodegenerative conditions for whom traditional EMG-based systems are not viable," Basit said. "We're also integrating gaze-tracking to make the interface more intuitive – allowing users to simply look at an object and think about an action to initiate it."The project is currently in the research and development phase. Basit noted that the team is currently working on optimising signal interpretation, reducing hardware complexity, and enabling real-time performance on edge added that the eBRAIN Lab is also developing AI-based MRI analysis for detecting MS lesions and brain tumours, which leverages multi-modal large language models to assist radiologists with diagnostic recommendations. Omni-Directional Drones and Humanoid Telepresence Robots At the Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics (CAIR), Postdoctoral Associate Mahmoud Hamandi and his team developed the OmniOcta UAV – the world's first fully functional battery-powered omnidirectional drone using only fixed, unidirectional thrusters. Unlike traditional drones that tilt to manoeuvre, the OmniOcta can hover, rotate and fly at extreme angles, such as a 90° roll, thanks to its eight precisely angled thrusters calculated via a custom optimisation algorithm."This makes it ideal for inspection in confined spaces, as well as for physical interaction tasks like pushing objects or even unscrewing a lightbulb," Hamandi explained. "It's also entirely self-contained and robust, requiring no external power or mechanical tilting." Sustainable Construction Material From NYUAD's Advanced Materials and Building Efficiency Research Laboratory (AMBER Lab), research scientist Inderjeet Singh presented two game-changing sustainable construction materials. This includes SaltCrete, a magnesium-based cement developed at the AMBER Lab using reject brine from desalination and calcium carbide slag. This process not only reuses industrial waste but also captures carbon dioxide during curing, making it a potential carbon sink, according to other material is Limestone Calcined Clay Cement (LC3), which combines calcined clay and limestone to reduce emissions by 40% compared to traditional cement. "SaltCrete reduces emissions by around 50% and supports waste valorisation, while LC3 is currently being tested in marine environments to build eco-friendly sea walls that preserve biodiversity," Singh said.
New York Times
27-04-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Pakistan Says It Killed 54 Militants Trying to Enter From Afghanistan
Pakistan's military said on Sunday that it had killed 54 militants trying to infiltrate the country from Afghanistan, highlighting the challenges its forces face on multiple fronts as tensions with India also rise rapidly. The operation against the fighters from Afghanistan took place on Friday and Saturday nights in North Waziristan, a remote district along Pakistan's northwestern border, its military said. Pakistani troops detected the movement of the large group of militants and killed all of them, the military said, adding that it had seized a cache of weapons and explosives. The 54 deaths reported were an usually high number in Pakistan's battle against instability along its border with Afghanistan during the nearly four years since the United States withdrew its military support from the country and the Taliban took power. The banned group Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or T.T.P., has intensified attacks on Pakistani security forces, straining ties between Pakistan's leaders and the Taliban in Afghanistan. Pakistan accuses the Taliban of harboring and supporting T.T.P. fighters, an allegation that the Taliban deny. The Pakistani government is also contending with an increasingly lethal insurgency among Baluch separatists in the country's southwest. And on the eastern front, Pakistani forces have been placed on alert as India appears to be moving toward military strikes inside the country after a deadly terrorist attack in Kashmir last week. Unlike in past crises, Pakistan no longer enjoys the robust U.S. military support it relied on during the 20-year American presence in Afghanistan. That loss has left the military facing one of its most challenging periods in years. Security officials say they are bracing for a sustained stretch of confronting battle-hardened militants in the west and southwest and the possibility of conventional skirmishes with nuclear-armed India to the east. Abdul Basit, a senior research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore, said that the killing of the 54 militants from Afghanistan 'paradoxically underscores both a success and a challenge for the Pakistani military,' which he described as 'increasingly sandwiched between its eastern and western borders.' 'India will keep the threat of potential military action alive,' Mr. Basit said, 'and stretch it as far as it can to keep the Pakistan military overstretched.'
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First Post
25-04-2025
- Politics
- First Post
‘No matter what India does, this problem is not going to go away': Former Pakistan envoy on Kashmir issue
For long Pakistan has taken cover of the Kashmir issue to mask its use of terrorism as state policy. After the Pahalgam terror attack, Firstpost spoke to former Pakistan envoy Abdul Basit. Here's what he says read more An Indian paramilitary vehicle escorts tourists after an attack in Pahalgam, about 90kms (55 miles) from Srinagar on April 23, 2025. Source: AFP As India navigates through the devastating Pahalgam attack that led to the death of 26 people, Pakistan's former envoy to India defended his country's policies in what India sees as decades-long streak of fomenting trouble in Jammu and Kashmir through terrorism. In an exclusive conversation with Firstpost, Pakistan's former High Commissioner to India Abdul Basit said the Kashmir issue is at the core of tensions between India and Pakistan and 'whatever India does, this problem is not going to go away'. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'In my view, and I have been saying this all along, that the Jammu and Kashmir dispute is a core problem between Pakistan and India,' Basit told Firstpost on Thursday. He urged both sides to discuss ways to settle the dispute. 'No matter what India does, this problem is not going to go away. It will continue to be there between Pakistan and India. It is time to think about how to settle this issue rather than ramping up to unnecessary rhetoric, creating more problems between our two countries,' he said. It's ironical that the Kashmir problem between India and Pakistan began with the latter invading Jammu and Kashmir barely two months after Independence in 1947. As a princely state Jammu and Kashmir signed the Instrument of Accession with India as per the provisions of the Indian Independence Act of 1947 that also paved the way for the creation of Pakistan through the partition of India. Jammu and Kashmir's accession to India was held legally valid by the United Nations. Basit assertion of the Kashmir issue remaining a perpetual problem appears to be an oversight of the historical fact, whether deliberate or a compulsion of a former diplomat. Pakistan's former High Comissioner to India Abdul Basit. File Image Basit emphasised that once this issue is settled, Pakistan will live as a normal neighbour to India. The remarks from the former Pakistani envoy came in the aftermath of the Pahalgam terror attack that saw India announcing five big measures against Pakistan. In response, Pakistan conducted an emergency meeting of the National Security Committee (NSC) and announced retaliatory measures. In the press release, which came shortly after Basit's interview with Firstpost, Pakistan announced that it is suspending all bilateral agreements with India, including the Simla Agreement, until 'New Delhi changes its conduct'. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'Once the dispute is settled, Pakistan will live as normal neighbours': Basit Basit said that the Kashmir dispute needs to be settled before anything else. 'The primary question is whether or not the two countries are willing to move in the direction of settling the Kashmir dispute. All other issues are peripheral in my view. Once this dispute is settled, you will see Pakistan living as normal neighbours and putting their relations on a positive trajectory,' he averred. During the interview, Basit attempted to put forward Pakistan's case in the ongoing diplomatic row. However, he glossed over some facts. When asked how some of the terrorists involved in the deadly attack were Pakistani nationals, Basit said, 'India started blaming Pakistan immediately after the attack or a false flag, I doubt there was any investigation or probe.' When Firstpost mentioned the fact that J&K Police released the identity of three terrorists involved in the attack, out of which two were Pakistanis, Basit dodged the question, saying, 'We do not know. Not a shred of evidence has been shared with anyone.' The Jammu and Kashmir Police has released the sketches of foreigner terrorists Hashim Musa alias Sulaiman and Ali Bhai alias Talha Bhai, and local terrorist Adil Hussain Thokar, believed to be involved in the Pahalgam attack. (Photo: J&K Police) Earlier today, the J&K police shared the names of two Pakistani and one local terrorist involved in the killing. They were: Hashim Musa alias Sulaiman, Ali Bhai alias Talha Bhai, and Adil Hussain Thokar (Local). The police have put a 20 lakh bounty on each of the terrorists. The Kashmir issue has been at the epicentre of India-Pakistan tensions after Pakistan infiltrated the then-princely state of Jammu and Kashmir soon after the partition, leading to an all-out India-Pakistan war of 1947-48. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Pakistan has for long denied its role in terrorism in India, despite its top leaders having openly admitted to Islamabad's so-called policy of 'bleeding India through a thousand cuts'. Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf said in TV interviews that the people who were seen as terrorists by the world were heroes for the establishment. The timing of it all The Pahalgam attack took place while US Vice President The incident drew all the attention from the visit. Interestingly, this is not the first time Pakistan has been accused of orchestrating such attacks during a monumental visit. There have been at least two instances in which terrorists carried out nearly identical attacks that also coincided with the visits of top US officials, one of them included the American president's visit to the country. US Vice President JD Vance receives the ceremonial guard of honour upon his arrival in New Delhi, India, on April 21, 2025. (Photo: X/Ministry of External Affairs) A similar attack took place in Chittisinghpora in J&K back in 2000 when terrorists killed 36 Sikhs in the region. The attack took place on the eve of the then-US President Bill Clinton's visit to India. Two years later, terrorists killed 23 people, including 10 children, in J&K's Jammu while a top State Department official was visiting India. Pakistan-backed terrorist groups were believed to be behind the attacks in both instances. One of the deadliest terror attacks that shook India was the 2008 Mumbai terror attack, also known as 26/11. On the fateful day, a group of 10 Pakistani terrorists launched attacks at multiple locations in Mumbai, killing 166 persons in the nearly 60-hour siege. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD While India has called out Pakistan for fostering terrorism whenever the issue has been discussed International level, Islamabad has seen the horrors of several terrorist groups within its soil. This begs the question of how India can sit at a negotiation table with Pakistan over the Kashmir dispute when Pakistan has been time and again accused of fostering terrorist groups, which also jeopardises India's national security.
Washington Post
24-04-2025
- Health
- Washington Post
Millions of U.S. measles cases forecast over 25 years if shots decline
The United States faces millions of measles cases over the next 25 years if vaccination rates for the disease drop 10 percent, according to new research published Thursday. No change in the current vaccination rate would result in hundreds of thousands of measles cases over the same period, according to a mathematical model produced by a team of Stanford University researchers. 'Our country is on a tipping point for measles to once again become a common household disease,' said Nathan Lo, a Stanford University physician and an author of the study published in the medical journal JAMA. At current state-level vaccination rates, the model predicts measles could become entrenched, resulting in 'hundreds of thousands of cases, where deaths are commonplace and hospitalizations are happening all the time,' said Lo, who researches the transmission of infectious diseases and the impact of public health interventions. The disease estimates are based on a simulation of what would happen in the United States under various vaccination rates for children. A small uptick in vaccination — a 5 percent increase in state-level rates — would prevent huge increases in measles cases, the study found. But Lo said he feared the most likely scenario is that childhood vaccination rates will continue to decline and the cumulative number of infections will rise sharply. Hesitancy to accept coronavirus vaccines has led more parents to question routine childhood vaccinations. Ongoing state policy debates about school vaccination requirements and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s interest in reexamining the childhood vaccine schedule could substantially reduce immunization coverage, he said. 'This is a warning of what our future could look like,' said Mujeeb Basit, a professor and expert on modeling and disease spread at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. Basit was not part of the study. The measles cases will accumulate over time, Basit said. 'To re-bend that curve, it's going to take a lot of time to revaccinate so many people.' The United States already has recorded about 800 measles cases in the first 3½ months of 2025, the largest number in a single year since 2019. The numbers continue to grow, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state health departments. Montana last week reported its first measles cases in 35 years. The majority of the infections have been reported in a West Texas outbreak that has led to the deaths of two children. A third death in New Mexico is also linked to the outbreak. Amid the continuing spread of the infectious-disease, most Americans have encountered false claims about the measles vaccine, and many aren't sure what the truth is, according to a KFF poll released Wednesday. More than half the adults surveyed expressed uncertainty about whether to believe false assertions, such as that the measles vaccine is more dangerous than the disease — claims that Kennedy has amplified. In the decade before a measles vaccine was introduced in 1963, an estimated 3 million to 4 million people in the United States were infected each year, 400 to 500 people died, 48,000 were hospitalized and 1,000 suffered swelling of the brain, or encephalitis, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But in 2000 the United States was finally able to declare measles eliminated, a term that means no continuous spread for more than a year. Cases and outbreaks still occur because of international travel, typically by an under-immunized U.S. traveler returning from a country where measles is endemic. For the new research, scientists used state vaccination, birth and death rates to find their results. They estimated current vaccination coverage for measles at between 87.7 percent and 95.6 percent. To prevent measles outbreaks, 95 percent of a community must receive two doses of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine. Based on what scientists know about the epidemiology of measles, one of the most contagious diseases on Earth, they forecast how it would spread from one community to another and how quickly it could spread regularly at increased rates throughout the country. The study did not take into account the difference in vaccination rates within a state, the authors said. Nor did it account for changes in immunization rates when infections increased because of an outbreak, which occurred during the covid pandemic, Basit said. But even the most conservative estimates underscore the severe consequences if measles reestablishes itself in the United States, the authors said. Measles outbreaks are surging globally, with Romania last year reporting the largest number of cases among 53 countries in Europe and Central Asia, according to the World Health Organization. Romania, with a population of about 19 million, had more than 30,000 cases in 2024, followed by Kazakhstan with about 28,000 cases. Romania's recent measles surge is linked to declining vaccination rates, vaccine hesitancy and disruptions in the health system during the coronavirus pandemic, health experts have said. In the United States, public health and infectious-disease experts have been talking for months about ways to combat false claims about vaccines and misinformation. On Thursday, an infectious-disease research center at the University of Minnesota announced an initiative to provide a coordinated response. 'People who care about preventing needless suffering and death from vaccine-preventable diseases have watched the current measles outbreak and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s rhetoric about vaccines with rising alarm,' said Michael Osterholm, director of the university's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, which launched the Vaccine Integrity Project. Initial funding for the project is from a foundation established by Christy Walton, an heir to the Walmart fortune, Osterholm said. The group does not plan to accept funding from industry. The goal is to address key vaccine issues 'if the U.S. government vaccine information becomes corrupted … or the system that helps to ensure their safety and efficacy are compromised,' Osterholm said in a news briefing. Osterholm cited an example in Minnesota, where Republican lawmakers introduced a bill that classifies mRNA vaccines as 'weapons of mass destruction' and criminalizes their manufacture, distribution and possession. The cutting-edge mRNA technology was behind the rapid development of lifesaving coronavirus vaccines. 'Is anybody at the federal government level going to respond to activities like that?' Osterholm said. 'That's a question I think we are left to at this point, unanswered.' The group will be led by an eight-member committee chaired by Margaret Hamburg, a former Food and Drug Administration commissioner, and Harvey Fineberg, past president of the National Academy of Medicine.
Express Tribune
24-04-2025
- Politics
- Express Tribune
Former envoy Abdul Basit calls India's Indus Treaty stance ‘symbolic', warns against cross-border strikes
Abdul Basit, Pakistan's former high commissioner to India (2014-2017) and ex ambassador to Germany (2012-2014) and former, has warned that New Delhi could launch a military action against Pakistan within days after the recent attack in Pahalgam. Speakling with The Express Tribune, Basit cited India's past actions after the 2016 Uri and 2019 Pulwama attacks as precedence. He said the tone of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's recent speech in Bihar indicated a potential cross-border strike or other tangible measures. 'It can happen across the Line of Control, on our side, and then they would make big claims that they have destroyed launch pads and terror camps,' he said. 'Whether it happens in a week's time or in a fortnight's time, something will happen.' Basit believes that there are no immediate diplomatic problems for Pakistan especially with regards to the cancellation of the Indus Waters Treaty, however, more terror actions in Balochistan and some other parts of the country can be expected, suggesting Pakistan should brace for further law and order destabilisation. Turning to India's announcement of suspending the Indus Waters Treaty, the former High Commissioner described the move as largely 'symbolic' due to India's current lack of infrastructure to divert the western rivers. 'At this stage, India cannot stop the flow of water,' he said. 'The Indus Waters Treaty can neither be terminated, nor suspended, nor amended unilaterally. It's a permanent treaty unless both parties agree.' He urged Pakistan to engage the World Bank, the treaty's broker and guarantor, and to prepare a robust diplomatic and legal response. 'India is not complying with its international obligations,' the diplomat added. 'So much for the world's largest democracy and its aspirations for a UN Security Council seat.' Despite the escalation, he noted that there was no immediate threat to Pakistan's water access under the treaty.
