Prof David De Cremer, who is Provost Chair and is also from the Dept of Management and Organisation at NUS Business School, noted that Boris Johnson and the Conservatives may have won the United Kingdom elections but that more complications lie ahead.

NUS and Starhub have teamed up to pilot virtual reality (VR) and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions in a net-zero energy building using 5G technologies to design and test advanced VR and AI solutions. The research activities will be conducted at an upcoming 5G laboratory hosted at SDE4.

In a ranking of the most liveable Chinese cities by the Asia Competitiveness Institute at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at NUS and the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, Yantai and Shandong topped the list while Harbin in Heilongjiang was last, with Hong Kong at the bottom of the list. Most of the Chinese cities that ranked higher on the list are located in the Shandong and Zhejiang provinces.

The NUS Graduate Research Innovation Programme (GRIP), launched in September 2018, guides postgraduate students and researchers in creating their own deep-tech start-ups. The University has committed $25 million to GRIP, with the aim of co-creating 250 companies over five years. To date, more than 40 teams have graduated from the programme, with several securing significant funding of up to $1 million. NUS Deputy President (Innovation and Enterprise) Prof Freddy Boey explained that these are firms based on cutting-edge, disruptive technologies that solve urgent problems.

Prof Kishore Mahbubani, Distinguished Fellow from the Asia Research Institute at NUS opined that Asean’s culture of accommodation and pragmatism has proven to be a source of strength in a year marked by growing United States-China tensions.

A study by researchers from the NUS Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University Health System and National Neuroscience Institute on local stroke mortality rates showed that while there is an increase in stroke incidences in Singapore, the stroke mortality rate continues to decline to a record low in seven years. This can be attributed to improved treatment in hospitals and higher awareness among the public, allowing patients to detect symptoms in a timely manner and to get effective treatment early. The study also showed that stroke patients in Singapore are younger when compared to patients from other developed countries, and Singapore is one of the countries with the highest probability of stroke in Asia. The results were revealed in the recent Annals Academy of Medicine journal.

A new book titled Marjorie Doggett’s Singapore: A Photographic Record has been published by NUS Press and the Hong Kong-based Photographic Heritage Foundation. It chronicles Singapore’s architectural heritage in the 1950s through photographs taken by Marjorie Doggett, an English woman living in Singapore then.

Five students from the NUS Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music were among the winners of the biennial National Piano and Violin Competition. For piano, Zheng Mingen and Seth Tan Xun Yu took the second and third positions respectively in the Artist category (25 years and below), and Wang Huang Hao Jia was placed first in the Senior category (21 years and below). Yuchen Zhang and Lau Joey were placed second and third respectively in the Artist category for violin.

Haelin Han, Lee Xin Yu and Loo Kee Jeng, students from NUS Business School, profiled Feinmetall Singapore and its journey towards Industry 4.0. With continual innovation and a commitment to its employees at its core, Feinmetall has proven that automation and growth can take place without alienating employees.

Professor Zheng Yongnian from the East Asian Institute at NUS opined that achievements in the West may not be due to democracy being superior; and to transform China, a cultured middle class must be created.