“Say: Travel through the Earth and deeply observe how God did originate the creation; then God produces the next creation; surely God has power over all things” (Qur’an 29:19-20)
Welcome and May the peace and blessings of God be upon you.
Photo: Pretty Drugthings / Unsplash
“Engineering is a rewarding career; you get an opportunity to work on the cutting edge of research, as scientific theory is always changing. The verses of the Qur’an never change, which makes me spiritual.”
- Hasina Huq
The idea of monitoring and surveillance can raise eyebrows and elicit strong emotions. Like many areas in life, perspective plays a significant role in the justification or lack thereof of a particular issue. For people with chronic diseases, surveillance is a completely different matter, that has the potential to create a different reality for those whose lives depend on knowing data and frequent monitoring.
“With Him (God) are the keys of the unseen, the treasures that none knoweth but He.” (Qur’an 6:59)
With all the advances in medicine, there are still many undiscovered biopathways of the human body. Monitoring the body, such as with electrocardiograms (heart electrical tracings) or laboratory results, allows researchers and physicians to understand its biological and chemical structure and processing. This is the type of research Dr. Hasina Huq is working on at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. As an electrical engineer she studies the interface between chemical and biological processes.
Source: WOU
Carbon is at the root of all living organisms: humans, plants, animals. Silicon is another naturally existing element, like carbon, one row below it on the periodic table (1). Silicon is used in many electronics and devices, like computers, iPhones, the stuff of our modern world (hence the term, “Silicon Valley”). With similar chemical properties, it could simulate organic material, like carbon. Our bodies, being organic material, could interface with silicon in a way to bridge the skin divide. The skin is a barrier, a shield, but it is also a gateway to understand the world for what it is: the warm sun, cold blows of winter, soft grass, sharp thorns, loving embraces, violent outbursts. For people with diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure and other chronic diseases that require frequent blood draws, they are reminded of their skin divide with needles to pierce their skin to measure blood sugar levels, electrolytes, kidney function, etc. What if an implanted (underneath the skin) sensor, called a biosensor, could change this whole paradigm? Biosensors are a form of wearable technology (2). If you’ve heard of FitBit or an Apple Watch, you’re already familiar with the concept.
Source: Sileo
With more advanced technology, people with diabetes wouldn’t have to poke their fingers four times a day to check blood sugar levels. Patients with heart disease could monitor their electrical heart tracings without wires going into their heart. Wearable technology has the potential to predict clinical outcomes and possibly improve human health (3). Similar to Dr. Huq’s research wearable technology is the interface between the physical/electrical world outside of our bodies and the electrical/biological world inside every human being. To Dr. Huq it is possible to bridge this gap since human beings are chemical/electrical beings, complex machines that have engineering principles, similar to the principles she learned in school. We may not consciously realize it every day, but our hearts produce electricity that set the beat and rhythm of our lives. Our organs perform chemical reactions every time we eat, move and breathe that keep us functioning. Being able to further understand these processes in a smarter, more accurate way is what drives Dr. Huq. Having precedent from the Islamic past and having her faith, she knows that this pursuit of knowledge is a spiritual enterprise as well.
Source: Art.com
“Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”
– ALBERT EINSTEIN
Jabir Ibn Hayyan lived in the Arab World during the 6th and 7th centuries (4). Known to the Western world as “Geber,” he is credited with leading the pathway to modern day chemistry. He studied alchemy and was even the court alchemist under the reign of Caliph Al-Rashid. He introduced experimentation into alchemy, carefully studying chemical processes while discovering new methods, to understand the underlying science. He performed modern methods we use today, such as crystallization and evaporation. Jabir found ways to prevent rusting and synthesized acids. He also invented a device to create distillation, called the Alembic. He took the physical world around him and performed enough research and experimentation to turn alchemy into chemistry, a legitimate scientific discipline and not one based on myth. He was a true alchemist.
Jabbar Ibn Hayyan
Source: Informory
The modern world continues to research old/current science and technology and turn it into more advancements. People like Dr. Huq continue to create their own alchemy every day, by discovering those technologies that were once only imagined. As we all pursue our own alchemy, what advancements will we discover and what impacts will it have on the nature we interface with every day?
“Read in the name of your Lord, who created man from a clot. Read, and your Lord is the Most Generous, who taught by then pen.” (Qur’an 96:1-4).
“But there is another alchemy, operative and practical, which teaches how to make the noble metals and colours and many other things better and more abundantly by art than they are made in nature. And science of this kind is greater than all those preceding because it produces greater utilities. For not only can it yield wealth and very many other things for the public welfare, but it also teaches how to discover such things as are capable of prolonging human life for much longer periods than can be accomplished by nature.”
- Sir Roger Bacon (English philosopher and Franciscan friar)
Notes
1. Periodic Table: https://www.isotopesmatter.com/applets/IPTEI/IPTEI.html
2. Tufts: https://sites.tufts.edu/eeseniordesignhandbook/2015/wearable-electronics/
3. Wearable technology: https://academic.oup.com/jamia/article/25/9/1221/5047137
4. Jabar ibn Hayyan: http://www.annsaudimed.net/index.php/vol27/vol27iss1/4685.html
For more information:
International Institute of Islamic Medicine: http://www.iiim.org
1001 Inventions: the Enduring Legacy of Muslim Civilization: http://www.1001inventions.com