Bassam Jalgha won the inaugural ‘Stars of Science‘ competition, an Arab reality television show where 16 aspiring scientists and engineers compete to have their idea selected for development and commercialization.

Image by Stars of Science

'Stars of Science' finalists Bassam Jalgha (right) and Mohammed Orsod

Jalgha’s winning idea, an automated tuner for the oud (a musical instrument), is the perfect blend between his two passions: science and music.

“I was always amazed by science, and I always had a curiosity to discover how things work,” Jalgha told me. “Since I was a kid I used to reverse engineer anything around me, without necessarily bringing it back to operation.”

Born in Furn El Chebback, a suburb of Beirut, Jalgha joined the Lebanese National Conservatory at age 12 and studied the oud, an Arabic string instrument similar to a lute or mandolin.

After receiving a music degree from the conservatory, Jalgha moved to the American University of Beirut and received a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering.

Jalgha continued playing the oud, even finding time to compose music (he wrote the score for the documentary film “The Sky Was Angry“).

During one of his engineering classes, Jalgha realized that he could combine his musical interests and his engineering skills to design a device that would tune the oud automatically.

The oud commonly has 11 strings: 5 pairs of strings plus a 6th individual string. Each string (or string pair) is tuned so that it plays a different pitch when plucked. By turning pegs at the end of the string, the player can change the tension of the string, listen to how the instrument sounds and adjust the pitch. Tuning the oud is similar to tuning a guitar, cello or violin, except that the oud has more strings (guitar usually has 6, cello and violin, 4).

Tuning the oud, however, is no small matter. Jalgha describes it as “a tedious task that requires much time and dedication.” Humidity, heat, and vigorous playing cause subtle changes to the length and tension of the strings; this requires the oud to be tuned frequently.

Jalgha remembers times when he was a beginner. In between lessons the oud would need to be tuned, but Jalgha couldn’t tune the instrument accurately. He had to wait until his next lesson so the teacher could spend 15 minutes and tune the oud for him. Meanwhile, Jalgha would practice with an instrument that was out of tune - not fun for Jalgha, and probably not pleasant for his neighbors.

Jalgha devised an apparatus that connects to the tuning pegs, listens to the sound of the plucked string, analyzes it and sends a signal to a motor that adjusts the peg until the string sounds the correct pitch. A powerful digital signal processor acts as the autotuner’s brain, identifying the frequency of the sound (the pitch) and comparing it to the desired frequency. After comparing the measured tone with the desired one, the processor sends a command to the motor, ordering it to rotate in a certain direction and with a certain speed to achieve fast tuning accurately.

The device is only connected to the oud during the tuning process; once the oud is properly tuned the device is removed.

The project is still in an early phase. “With the acquired money and support I received from the [Stars of Science] competition, I intend on further developing the tuner device as a product to enter the commercial market,” Jalgha said. He also hopes to modify the autotuner for use on other stringed instruments beside the oud.

Jalgha is now studying for a master’s degree in engineering at the American University of Beirut. He continues to play the oud, despite the intense time commitment of his engineering studies.

“I believe that if someone wants to do something and he gives it all the energy it needs he cannot but succeed in a way or another,” Jalgha said. “You just need the will to do it, and to convince yourself that you can do it.”

Image by Stars of Science

Bassam Jalgha celebrates his victory

Young scientists from all over the world come to the United States for graduate school and research fellowships. At the end of their training, they face a dilemma: stay in the United States, where the funding for science is among the best in the world, or return home and face more perilous funding. Stay and fully develop your scientific potential, or return home to improve the scientific capabilities of a developing nation?

At the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience I met many young scientists facing this choice.

Take Maria Chahrour, a Lebanese graduate student in human genetics at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. Chahrour made an interesting discovery that any scientist (including me) would love to have made, and published it in Science magazine, one of the most prestigious scientific journals in the world. And she’s still in graduate school! At this rate, she will have little problem getting a faculty position at Harvard or Yale.

She was one of several Lebanese scientists who told me the major challenge for scientists in Lebanon is funding for research. Lebanese universities focus on student education and have not made research a priority. Recently the American University in Beirut (AUB) formed the Abu Haidar Neuroscience Institute to concentrate on research. At AUB, it is possible to accomplish anything a scientist would hope to accomplish in the United States – it just takes longer.

What will Chahrour do? Will she stay in the United States, where she can use her scientific capabilities to their fullest? Or will she return to Lebanon, and sacrifice some of her scientific potential – discoveries that might help cure or prevent disease – in the hopes of improving science in Lebanon?

“I will try and accomplish both,” Chahrour said, adding she won’t be satisfied sacrificing either her scientific capabilities or the chance to improve research in Lebanon.