Sara bint Mashhour Launches New Science and Technology Initiative 'ilmi' in Riyadh

Sara bint Mashhour Launches New Science and Technology Initiative 'ilmi' in Riyadh
TT
20

Sara bint Mashhour Launches New Science and Technology Initiative 'ilmi' in Riyadh

Sara bint Mashhour Launches New Science and Technology Initiative 'ilmi' in Riyadh

Saudi Arabia has announced the launching of ilmi, a new Center for Science, Technology, Reading, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics (STREAM) learning, created by Princess Sara bint Mashhour bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, wife of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.

ilmi (“my knowledge” in Arabic) will be a fully accessible Science Discovery and Innovation Center that inspires and empowers young people across Saudi Arabia to explore and create, as well as to tackle challenges hands-on, the Saudi Press Agency reported Saturday.

A philanthropic, non-government initiative incubated and supported by the Mohammed bin Salman Foundation Misk as one of its subsidiaries, ilmi will operate in partnership with Mohammed bin Salman Nonprofit City, it said.

Princess Sara bint Mashhour bin Abdulaziz Al Saud said: “ilmi will be a beacon of creativity, learning and accessibility. It will offer all Saudi Arabia’s young and lifelong learners the ability to realize their potential, further drive advances in the Kingdom, and help shape the future. Together, I hope that we will all create ilmi, and inspire and support our next generation.”

At ilmi’s core is a unique approach that seeks to project a detailed, qualitative picture of how young people across Saudi Arabia best connect with STREAM subjects. Using this information, together with its young audience and alongside parents, teachers, learning experts, employers, scientists, creative individuals, and entrepreneurs, ilmi will co-create a regularly refreshed program of STREAM content, ensuring that its offering remains relevant to young people as their needs evolve.

Located in Mohammed bin Salman Nonprofit City in Riyadh and opening in 2025, the ilmi center spans 27,000 square meters and reflects the city’s goals to embody creativity and sustainability through integration in its natural surroundings and extensive landscaping, and make use of natural light, SPA said.

Planned permanent exhibitions will be based around three core themes, Our World, Our Selves, and Our Inventions, and will focus on issues including space, ecosystems and AI. The center will also host a variety of installations, events, talks, performances and learning partner programs designed to build a new STREAM community in Saudi Arabia.

ilmi will offer an integrated digital platform combined with a series of pop-up learning experiences across Saudi Arabia. These will start to go live this summer and aim to get young people, parents, families and friends of all ages and abilities excited and engaged in STREAM before ilmi’s physical home opens.

Launching soon, ilmi’s online offering will feature a series of exciting, gamified design challenges that explore key STREAM concepts, connect them to real life, and invite participants to come up with creative responses as part of a competition. To support this initiative, ilmi will also hold a series of live activations that will explore the STREAM content behind each digital challenge and encourage families and friends to work together to create and build solutions live.



Tourist Coins Pose Giant Problem at N. Ireland's Famous Causeway Site

Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)
Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)
TT
20

Tourist Coins Pose Giant Problem at N. Ireland's Famous Causeway Site

Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)
Tourists are pictured at the Giant's Causeway, a Unesco World Heritage Site, near Bushmills in Northern Ireland, on July 8, 2025. (Photo by PAUL FAITH / AFP)

Northern Ireland's Giant Causeway draws close to one million visitors a year but their habit of wedging tiny coins in cracks between the rocks -- to bring love or luck -- is damaging the world-famous wonder.

Now authorities are urging tourists to keep their coins in their pockets to preserve the spectacular landscape.

Some 40,000 columns mark the causeway, Northern Ireland's first UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Geologists say the natural phenomenon was created by an outpouring of basalt lava 60 million years ago.

Legend has it that the causeway was formed by Irish giant Finn McCool.

In recent decades, visitors have pushed thousands of coins into fissures in the rocks.

The gesture is "a token of love or luck", according to Cliff Henry, the causeway's nature engagement officer.

But the coins rapidly corrode and expand, causing the basalt to flake and leaving "unsightly" rust-colored streaks, Henry told AFP.

He pointed to streaks on a rock and gingerly prized out a US cent with a set of keys.

"We get a lot of euros and dollar cents. But coins from literally all over the world -- any currency you can think of, pretty much -- we have had it here," he said.

A report by the British Geological Survey in 2021 revealed that the coins were "doing some serious damage" and something had to be done about it, he noted.

Signs are now in place around the site appealing to tourists to "leave no trace".
"Once some visitors see other people have done it, they feel that they need to add to it," causeway tour guide Joan Kennedy told AFP.

She and her colleagues now gently but firmly tell tourists to desist.

At the exit from the causeway, a US couple said they were "distressed" to hear of the damage the metal caused.

"Our guide mentioned as we came up that people had been putting coins into the stones. It's really terrible to hear that," said Robert Lewis, a 75-year-old from Florida.

"It's kind of like damaging any kind of nature when you are doing something like that, putting something foreign into nature. It's not good," said his wife, Geri, 70.

As part of a £30,000 ($40,000) conservation project, stone masons recently removed as many coins as they could -- without causing further damage -- from 10 test sites around the causeway.

Henry said the trial was successful and is to be expanded across the causeway.

"If we can get all those coins removed to start with that will help the situation and hopefully no more coins will be put in," he said.

"If visitors see fewer coins in the stones and hear appeals to stop the damaging practice, the problem can maybe be solved.

"We know that visitors love and cherish the Giant's Causeway, and many form deep personal connections to it, so we want this natural wonder to remain special for future generations."