The Five Inventions and Scientific Breakthroughs You Didn’t Know Involved Malaysians | by Lynelle Tham
Illustration by Jiaxin and Cheok Hua.
From producing our own national car to clinching the first medal for para-badminton at the 2021 Paralympics, Malaysia is proud to have achieved many things in the last 64 years. However, most people don’t realise that we have also created some of the coolest inventions. To some extent, we even contributed to a few scientific developments. Here are five you probably didn’t know about:
#1 USB Flash Drive
Photo by Nicholas Chan
USB flash drives emerged in the early 2000s. The brainchild of Datuk Pua Kien Seng was produced a year after establishing Phison Electronics. Although research on flash memory technology already started when he was just a third year electrical and control engineering student at Chiao Tung University, Taiwan.
Compared to floppy disks or CDs used back then, USB flash drives are smaller and faster because of the lack of moving parts. Despite being the size of a chewing gum pack, they can hold about 11,380 times more data since the storage often comes in gigabytes (GB) rather than megabytes (MB). Given these upsides, the ability to rewrite became a bonus, which made floppy disks and CDs not practical enough.
Phua’s legacy still prevails. Nearly every desktop and laptop has USB ports as a standard. Flash drive capacities on the market continue to increase. Meanwhile, high speed has become a standard for modern flash drives.
#2 Lytro Camera
Inspiration for the Lytro Camera struck after its inventor, Ren Ng, found it difficult to capture the image of a family friend’s daughter. He thought, “What if you could take a picture, and then adjust the focus later?”
This prompted Ng to switch his theoretical research focus at Stanford University to cameras. The Lytro camera took approximately nine years of research and development before its breakthrough in 2011.
What sets the Lytro camera apart from conventional digital cameras is the sensor. It could gather more information about the light entering, recording the entire “light field”. The vast amount of data allowed photographers to adjust the photo’s focus following their desires using a computer. With that, the ‘focus-free’ camera can capture images faster due to “no shutter lag”.
Although Ng’s company closed in 2018, competitors are still trying to replicate the same technology. Even Apple’s Steve Jobs approached Ng to discuss improvements for the iPhone camera in 2011.
#3 N95 Mask
Photo by Nicholas Chan
Some of us were definitely surprised to see the Google Doodle honouring Dr Wu Lien Teh earlier in March this year. Little did we know the Malayan doctor created a precursor to the N95 mask.
The origins of the N95 mask go as far back as 1910 during a pneumonic plague across Manchuria (now known as Northern China). Wu developed surgical masks into more substantial ones with layers of gauze and cotton to filter the air. Upon its success, Wu’s mask was then widely produced and distributed. Medical staff, soldiers and everyday people wore them. Then, when the Spanish Flu arrived in 1918, Wu’s mask rose to even more popularity.
Thanks to Dr. Wu’s ingeniousness, there are now better and more protective variations of his mask available in the market today.
#4 Microsolar
Photo by Kindel Media on Pexels
In 1999, TIME Magazine featured Teoh Siang Leik as one of the Heroes for the Planet/Design for inventing a solar water heater called the Microsolar. Yet this didn’t come easy, as Teoh spent 25 years developing it. The first breakthrough took place in Nepal in 1982, then three years later in Malaysia.
Running fully on solar energy, Teoh’s simple engineering maneuver can reach a maximum of 100 degrees. It was more than enough for an entire family of five to take two hot showers a day. Since it doesn’t operate using electricity, the Microsolar only costed a family of five $100 annually back then.
Teoh’s hot invention remains relevant today. Besides using solar energy to heat water, the Microsolar now functions as a super-efficient heat exchanger to power air-conditioning units so that they could run without guzzling electricity. Meanwhile, countries like Kenya use it for water pasteurisation.
#5 PfSPZ Malaria vaccine
Photo by Frank Meriño on Pexels
The World Health Organisation (WHO) gave the RTS,S malaria vaccine the green light on October 6, but there is also another vaccine in the making: the PfSPZ. One of its developers is a Malaysian scientist named Dr Betty Sim Kim Lee. Born and raised in Kota Bharu, she is currently the president and leading researcher of Sanaria, a Maryland-based biotechnology firm that’s developing the vaccine.
The PfSPZ is a chemo-attenuated, live whole parasite vaccine administered with an anti-malarial drug to kill the parasites. According to the European Pharmaceutical Review, clinical studies have shown that it has 75 to 77 per cent of protection. Thanks to this vaccine, 200 million clinical cases and greater than 550,000 deaths every year will be reduced and eventually eliminated.
Despite being a small country, Malaysians have plenty to offer. These inventions and scientific developments have indeed placed the country on the map. Most importantly, they have all significantly improved our standard of living, be it locally or globally. For this reason, the government and us must invest more in science and technology. Hopefully, we may see more remarkable creations and contributions by Malaysians in the future.
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