Science in the Islamic world has been invigorated by the events of the Arab Spring, experts said at a panel at the 2012 Annual Meeting. Several of the new governments are considering innovation among their national priorities, and science may benefit from new educational and entrepreneurial reforms.

Like many aspects of life since the revolutions began, the panel suggested, science and technology are changing nearly on a day-to-day basis. Research and development spending is rising slowly, more scientists are filling high government positions, and some in the Islamic scientist diaspora are considering a return to work in their home countries.

It's the continuation of a renaissance that began before the first Tunisian protests in late 2010, the speakers said. Gathered at the AAAS meeting from Egypt, Malaysia, and Pakistan, the participants presented "field updates" on the progress of science and innovation across the region.

The data collected for these updates will be the backbone of The Atlas of Islamic-World Science and Innovation, a three-year survey of science now underway across nine countries in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia.  Using detailed, independent reports on the scientific capacity, barriers, and opportunities for each of the countries, the project hopes to map out key trends in science and innovation across the diverse governments and populations included in the Islamic world.

The report for Malaysia is the first report to be released publicly, but the experts said they are seeing similar challenges across all the countries as they prepare the remaining Atlas entries.

Setting national priorities for science and innovation is a top concern, they agreed. Most Islamic nations invest very small percentages of their gross domestic product in research and development. In 2007, the 57 countries of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference spent an average of .38% of GDP on research, compared to a global average of 1.7%.

Even in places where R&D budgets are on the rise, said Professor K. Thiruchelvam, a former University of Malaya professor,  countries often don't do enough to spend the money effectively.

In Malaysia, R&D spending doubled between 2004 and 2008, Thiruchelvam said, but the impact of the funding has been diluted between too many competing agencies with "poor execution and monitoring of their plans."

In Egypt, "we also have these separate islands of research centers and centers of excellence, but they are not networked," said Marwan Elwakil, a researcher at Bibliotheca Alexandria. As a consequence, each center attempts to recreate "everything from the pin to the rocket," she said, leaving the country without any research priorities that would distinguish the nation in the global scientific community.

Zahoor Hassan, a professor at the Lahore University of Management Sciences in Pakistan, said scientific directions in his country often arise from "individual passions rather than institutional priorities." When a researcher moves on, he said, their expertise disappears as well.

The strong links between research and industry that drive innovation and economic development elsewhere in the world are mostly missing in Islamic countries, the speakers suggested. In Egypt, "only 5% of the total R&D investment comes from non-government sources," Elwakil said, "and we need many more venture capitalists."

Political change in the region, particularly political decentralization, may encourage more researchers to start large research-based companies, Hassan suggested. Small businesses are everywhere in Pakistan, he said, "but we just need a few examples of success stories, one or two large companies to break out of the mold."

Hassan said new industries could also "give young people opportunities to work at cutting-edge science" as some Islamic scientists encouraged by the Arab Spring movement return to their home countries after working in Europe and North America.

In Egypt, Elwakil said, Nobel laureate Ahmed Zewail has launched the Zewail City of Science and Technology to encourage young Egyptians in particular to practice 21st century science and contribute to national productivity. But  "with a third of its population illiterate, and brain drain further exacerbating the situation, Egypt has a lot of catching up to do," she said.

Naser Faruqui, director of policy and science innovation at Canada's International Development Research Centre, hopes that science will flourish under new, more open governments in the Islamic world. But the changes will not mean much, he warned, if the science itself doesn't address regional challenges like poverty and environmental degradation.

"The governments may have changed," Faruqui said, "but the revolutions will fail if lives are not better off."