Item 1: The first assignment

Which idea in those two articles do you think is the most important to the profession? Briefly explain your choice in about 300 words.

The job scopes of engineers are no longer restricted on building and designing buildings or machineries. They can involve in many different sectors which include banking, finance or even health care as engineering tertiary education "trains the mind to systematically analyse complex sets of information and to apply systems thinking in designing solutions" (Prof Seeram Ramakrishna, The expanding world of engineers). There are many areas which engineers can develop their potential on, but the main concerns which I think engineers should focus on will be the vulnerability face by the human.

Due to our rapid development, increase usage of fossil fuel and deforestation, global warming has surfaced. Human activities have degraded the surrounding environment. Forest was cleared for housing and agriculture and more air pollutants were emitted to the surrounding due to industrial purposes. Human are facing the adverse impacts from the melting of the ice glaciers from the North and South poles and weather changes. These have result in poor yields from the farmers and also endanger low laying countries such as Venice due to the rise of sea level. Thus, engineers have to design counter measures to minimise the greenhouse gases without affecting the development of the countries. Natural disasters include earthquake, typhoon have caused lots of damages to properties and loss of lives. Hence, engineers have to explore new methods of protection and prevention to solve this problem.

According to an article, " Global warming is not only a treat to our future health, it already contributes to more than 150000 deaths and 5 million illness annually, according to a team of health and climate scientists at the World Health Organisation and the University of Wisconsin at Madison - and those numbers could DOUBLE by 2030 "( Larry West, About.com).

This astonishing figure is very shocking and it shows our vulnerability to diseases and virus. Pandemics diseases such as the SARS which "has infected more than 6900 people, killing almost 500" (CNN.com, May 8 2003) are deadly to us. Thus, it is important for engineers to manufacture new resistance medicine to counter threatening diseases for the society. Our survivals are greatly depended on these biomedical engineers.

In a nut shell, the engineers have the abilities to analyse different situations and provide the most efficient solutions. Their priority is not only safeguarding the interests of the mankind, but also the environment. Henceforth, equilibrium must be reach between these two areas so as to minimise the vulnerability face by our future generations.