Cape Coast, Nov. 19, GNA- The Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) has installed a Differential Optical Absorption Spectometer (DOAS) system worth about $30,000 to enable it assess the impact of industrial emissions into the atmosphere.

The DOAS system, which is the first of its kind in the country, is capable of checking emissions from industries in Tema up to a distance of 10 kilometres, and was donated by the International Science for Atmospheric Climate (ISAC), based in Italy. Dr. Kofi Kodua Sarpong, Chief Executive of the company, made this known at the 'International Conference on Optics and Lasers in medicine and Environmental Monitoring for Sustainable Development (OPTOLASERMED 2007), which opened at the University of Cape Coast (UCC) on Monday.

The 10-day conference, the first to be held in Africa, is aimed at sharing knowledge about how optical biomedical technologies and biophotonics can help in enhancing medical and environmental sciences. About 70 optical scientists, physicians, engineers, technologists and professionals operating in the fields of optical spectroscopy, modern optics, lasers, medicine, environmental monitoring and biophotonics as well as graduate students, from Africa, Asia, America, Europe and Australia. It is being organized by the Laser and Fibre Optics Center (LAFOC) of the UCC, in collaboration with among others, the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), International Commission for Optics (ICO), and TOR. The objectives of the conference include, providing a platform for training upcoming medical practitioners and scientists for the dissemination of medical, practical and scientific knowledge in laser technology and optics.

Dr. Sarpong stressed the determination of the company to make the safety of the refinery and of the people within and around its environs its paramount interest, and therefore expressed delight that the company's collaboration with the academia had given it "an extra mile" into the sustainable management of industrial activities in Tema. He said already, two engineers of the company have been invited to Italy to study the use and operation of the system. The TOR boss pledged that TOR and the Oil Marketing Companies will continue to support such collaboration which is imperative to improve their operations.

He noted that considering the operations of such industries and their effect on the populace, it was laudable to monitor pollutants and their consequent effect using optics and laser technologies. He, in this regard, expressed the hope that the conference will assist industrialists, engineers and medical practitioners in their deliberations to "speak against possible actions and inactions that may affect the health status of our people. In a key-note address read for him, the Minister of Education, Science and Sports, Professor Dominic Fobih, also underscored the importance of the use of optics and lasers for socio-economic advancement.

He announced that with the new dimension of laser applications, his Ministry will consider expanding facilities at LAFOC to enhance research work to support the UCC's School of Medical Sciences, which takes off next year.

The Minister said, in this way, the immediate use of laser technology in medicine and environmental monitoring will be at our doorstep in fostering and supplementing good health care delivery. He said, already, in recognition of the importance of this technology, his ministry has introduced the subject of lasers in the new educational reform programme in the high school curriculum, and was happy that some students in Cape Coast have had the privilege of visiting LAFOC to be abreast of the technology. He said the consideration of the application of laser technologies to the students, who are the future engineers and medical practitioners, at the conference, would be a long term investment into their formation period.

Prof. Fobih, in this regard, commended Prof Maria Calvo Padilla of the University of Madrid, and Secretary to the ICO, for planning to demonstrate the application of lasers to girls from high schools in the Cape Coast municipality. He expressed the hope that the conference will discuss the need to integrate optics and photonics in the new direction of laser applications in medicine and environmental monitoring.

Prof. Fobih described the conference as the beginning of technology transfer that links up academic institutions to industry in research endeavours and therefore urged industries and academic institutions to foster research teams to help solve challenging problems encountered by industries and hospitals. In his welcoming address, the Vice-Chancellor of the UCC, Rev. Prof Emmanuel Adow Obeng stressed that environmental pollution had become a major concern, while there was no proper monitoring mechanism to stem it.

He pointed out that health and environment cannot be separated and that a sound environment improved the health of the people, which in turn increased productivity. He said the establishment of LAFOC had enabled the university to enhance its research work and expressed gratitude to the ICTP for its immense assistance to LAFOC.

Dr Mohammed Shabbat, of the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex System, in Dresden Germany, and one of the participants to the conference, was presented with a medal, a diploma and an unspecified cash donation for winning the 'ICO Galileo Galilee Award' for his work in Theoretical and electro-magnetic Optics, "accomplished under comparative unfavourable circumstances".

Dr. Shabbat, a Palestinian, is the first scientist from the Arab world to win the award which was instituted in 1993. Among topical issues being discussed at the conference, are "Diagnostics and treatment of malignant tumors using laser techniques", "new possibilities with X-rays in the fields of medicine and paleontology" and "laser sources in medicine and environmental monitoring".