King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) recently signed agreements with universities in countries such as Australia, Hungary, Ireland and Switzerland for the first time. These collaborations have been arranged at the faculty level.

The new partners include Trinity College Dublin, Harvard University, the University of Kentucky, Clemson University in South Carolina, Australia’s University of Wollongong, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne of Switzerland and Széchenyi István University in Hungary.

The existing, larger-scale partnerships including the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Stanford, Cornell, Oxford, National Taiwan University and HKUST were secured before work on building the campus began.

"All early partnerships were established at the institutional level" Global Collaborative Research director Dr. Mustafa Al-Ali.

With the University now in its second year, a "bottom-up approach" is being encouraged by senior leadership. Faculty have been encouraged to drive future partnerships based on needs and the strategic research directions of KAUST.

"We have introduced a competitive program," explained KAUST Global Collaborative Research (GCR) director Dr. Mustafa Al-Ali.

"We asked our faculty to submit proposals for activities, with their own choice of partners, that are connected and complementary so that each project includes research both inside and outside the Kingdom”

The program attracted a strong response from faculty; ten partnerships (see below) were awarded from the 50 proposals submitted.

"The proposals went through the peer review process and the selection panel evaluated them and came up with the top-ranked ones,” added Dr. Al-Ali.

"As we expand our geographic distribution we are bringing research to KAUST that is of importance and will enrich the universitys research agenda.

"What matters is that it comes from a strong group with a good reputation. "

Faculty Initiated Collaborations - The Winners

Advanced Computational Platform for Electron Transport in Electronic Devices and Biological Sensors

Udo Schwingenschlogl (PI), Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering.

Collaborating Organization (C.o.): Trinity College Dublin (Ireland).

Diamond nanocrystals : a novel sensing platform for nanomedicine and building blocks for self- ass embled functional nanocomposites Osman Bakr (PI), Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering.

C.O.: , École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and Harvard.

Energy Harvesting & Waste Heat Recovery Using Oxide Thermoelectrics

Husam Alshareef (PI), Assoc. Professor of Materials Science and Engineering ; Udo Schwingenschlogl (co-PI), Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering.

C.O.: Clemson University.

Expanding the Genetic Code for Design and Engineering of Biocatalysts :

Jorg Eppinger (PI), Assistant Professor of Chemical Science ; Samir Hamdan (co-PI), Assistant Professor of Chemical and Biological Sciences.

C.O.: The Scripps Research Institute & Technische Universitat Munchen.

The Genetic Basis of Obesity/Diabetes in the Saudi Population

Tim Ravasi (PI), Associate Professor of Chemical and Life Sciences ; Chris Voolstra (co-PI), Assistant Professor, Red Sea Research Center; Annika Haywood (co-PI), Research Scientist International Medical Center (Saudi Arabia).

C.O.: University of California, San Diego

Genomic, Transcriptomic, and Proteomic View of a Photosynthetic Algae, chromerid,and Evolutionary “Missing Link” to the Human Malaria Parasites

Arnab Pain (PI), Associate Professor of Chemical and Life Sciences ; Aswini Panigrahi (co-PI), Senior Research Scientist, Biosciences Core Lab.

C.O.: Biology Centre, Academy of Sciences (Czech Republic)

KAUST-USF Metal -Organic Materials Network: Smart Materials for Energy and Environmental Sustainability

Mohamed Eddaoudi (PI), Professor of Chemical Science.

C.O.: University of South Florida

Molecular-Scale Design and Engineering of Nanostructured Organic Solar Cells

Aram Amassian (PI), Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering ; Ghassan Jabbour (co-PI), Professor of Materials Science and Engineering.

Markus Hadwiger (co-PI), Assistant Professor of Mathematical and Computer Sciences.

C.O.: Georgia Tech University, KFUPM (Saudi Arabia) & University of Kentucky

Positive Numerical Solution of Differential Equations

David Ketcheson (PI), Assistant Professor of Applied Mathematics.

C.O.: Szechenyi Istvan University (Hungary), University of Massachussetts- Dartmouth & CWI (Netherlands).

Single Molecule View of DNA Replication

Samir Hamdan (PI), Assistant Professor of Chemical and Biological Sciences; Sahroui Chaieb (co-PI), Assoc. Professor Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science.

C.O.: University of Wolongong (Australia)