Relatively the word tissue engineering and regenerative medicine is not new, it was officially coined at a National Science Foundation workshop in 1988 to mean ‘the application of principles and methods of engineering and life sciences toward the fundamental understanding of structure-function relationships in normal and pathological mammalian tissues and the development of biological substitutes to restore, maintain or improve tissue function’.
To many Malaysians, the words are considered science fiction rather than amazing work in biotechnology. During my appointment at MIT and Harvard Medical School, I was overwhelmed with the advancement of work and technology in biomedical and bioengineering field. There were plenty of lectures, classes, forum and discussions around Cambridge that available for free and open to the public, regardless of age - and conducted by prominent professors and scientists in the field. The experience was an eye-opening, where school children and students gathered and participate actively during the sessions. Many of them displayed enthusiasm and excitement at learning new experience and information. I wish the same could be done in Malaysia too. We have a lot of scientists and engineers working in creative and advance technological field where public engagement with students and community will be the best way to nurture and instill love for scientific knowledge and humanity.
To quote Isaac Asimov, prominent science fiction novelist (I, Robot and Bicentennial Man) and also a Biochemistry professor at Boston University "the saddest aspect of life right now is the science gathers knowledge faster than the society gains wisdom".
The same was also written by T. S. Eliot in "The Information Age", "With all the technological advances and change, Is mankind happier or wiser than he was 100 ... Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?"
Rapid acceleration of technological advancement is affecting human value, the rise of inequality need to be addressed and tackled if we are planning to build a nation that not only able to withstand enemy of a thousand fleet, but to live in harmony for a thousand years. As dramatic as it sounds, I believe that academicians, scientists and engineers need to be good investors with our public education system, especially for early-childhood education.
Schools are the center field of our children's academic life and the pillar of nation building. Our education system today fail to inspire and educate the younglings to be happy, creative, innovative and empathy to the surrounding issues and environment such as refugee crisis and inequality.
I strongly believe that we need to reinvent our education system through holistic mechanisms by working closely with academicians, professionals and the people from walks of life to nurture understanding and broaden their communications, social skills, emotional intelligence as well as curiosity.
My hope for younger generation of Malaysia is they will love this country and live in harmony alongside others from diverse community, background, religion and social status. It is one thing to feel optimism when I am away from the country I love for a very long time (14 years) and sitting comfortably in ivory tower. My heartfelt love towards my country never falters. My experience volunteering for Medicines Sans Frontier with displaced community in a campaign "Forced from Home", shrugged me off the comfortable zone as it became unfathomable to ignore that there are wars happening around the world with more than 60 millions people are being displaced due to economic crisis, threats, climate change and health reasons.
I feel that it is the responsibility of academicians to not only deliver knowledge but to instill humanity and good values in every person.
The future of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine could be dystopia if human lose its humanity and values. The tragedy of mankind could be averted if we start thinking about us as a whole community and global citizen and working towards equality and improvement of everyone's life.
Elon Musk, the co-founder of PayPal and successful entrepreneur of Tesla, X-Space etc envisioned that for humanity to survive and become interplanetary species, we will need to integrate with artificial intelligence.
The story of human creation and production of replaceable organs for human use was first written by Mary Shelly in her famous novel called "Frankenstein". It is called the Modern Prometheus for the ability of Dr. Frankenstein to steal secret from nature to create life. In the novel, she pictured the grim consequences of invention without installation of humanistic value.
George Church, the prominent scientist behind GENOME and ENCODE project, genetic editing using Crispr-9 technology from Harvard University has recently established a start-up company and working in collaboration with Smithfield, the largest producer of pork industry with two billion dollar funding to transform pigs' genetic to be compatible with human for organ replacement. The deficit of human organ supplies are the main driver for this initiative. The subject of human organ transplantation and supply is dire. The idea that this project could avert problems and unethical work with human organ trafficking and killings is noble but would transplantation with animal organs make us less human and drive inequality gap even wider?
Should human resort to animals organ when there are avenues of tissue engineering and regeneration that can be used to bring quality of life?
These are the questions that I would like to address to the younger generation of Malaysians.
I also would like the younger generation to enjoy reading works of classic novelist in science fictions such as Isaac Asimov, Jules Verne, Edgar Allen Poe, Herman Melvin as well as our own Ramli Awang Murshid.
Perhaps we need to read Yann Martel's "We ate the children last" to rethink and revalue of radical medical breakthrough and its possible consequences.
Alas, I feel that we need to contemplate long at this quote in the quest of the holy grail in human tissue engineering, science has made us god, even when we are not worthy as human" - unknown.
