Egyptian Faculty Advance Energy Research with Arizona State University Mentors through USAID-funded Center of Excellence for Energy Program
Phoenix, AZ, April, 2024 – The Center of Excellence for Energy, funded by the American people through the United States Agency for International Development, is hosting a Post-Doctoral Exchange Program, offering faculty in energy related fields at the center’s Egyptian partner universities the opportunity to develop their skills and conduct research at Arizona State University. The teams of faculty, including both the visiting Egyptian professors and the Arizona State University professors, report major progress towards advancing energy research in areas vital to global grand challenges in renewable energy.
“The Post-Doctoral Exchange Program offers faculty at our Egyptian partner universities the unique opportunity to collaborate and innovate with their counterparts at Arizona State University.” says Dr. Sayfe Kiaei, Center of Excellence for Energy project director and Arizona State University professor. “This convergence of ideas and minds from around the world creates a synergy that serves to advance energy research and solutions for both Egypt and the global community and could result in new research, publications, and intellectual property.”
The Center of Excellence for Energy aims to support Egypt in meeting its energy transition goal of 42% renewable energy by 2035. The center works with stakeholders to increase higher education capacity to produce a strong work force in the energy sector by assessing and developing curriculum and laboratory space, conducting binational research that is pertinent to the energy sector, and facilitating exchanges and trainings as well as developing revenue streams for the long-term sustainability of the center.
Eight faculty members, five from Aswan University, two from Mansoura University, and one from Ain Shams University, arrived in Arizona in January and met their Arizona State University faculty mentors, which they had been working with to develop a research proposal prior to their departure. Research is being conducted in areas pertinent to the energy challenges faced in Egypt, and globally, with focus areas that include waste-energy conversion, solar panel degradation, energy storage, electric vehicle batteries, and more.
One example of such projects includes the research Dr. Naira Meky, assistant professor at Aswan University, and Dr. Essam Mahmoud, also from Aswan University, are conducting with Dr. Deng, professor in the Arizona State University School for Engineering of Matter, Transport, and Energy, on converting biowaste, like food and crop waste, into biofuel and biochar. The biochar can then be used to remove metals from water making it safe for use.
The visiting professors and their mentors say they learned a lot from the collaboration and will continue to work together after the exchange. Dr. Meky notes that the ASU mentors are “very kind, very supportive, and they helped us to enlarge our knowledge and elevated our research quality…and they gave us a lot of guidance here in the lab.”
Dr. Deng has high hopes for the research they are doing stating that the Egyptian professors “can carry this research back to their own country and then they can find some good applications for it because this is a very useful project.” Dr. Deng also notes that they are working to publish the research together.
For more information on the Post-Doctoral Exchange Program and other center activities, visit the Center of Excellence for Energy.
The Center of Excellence for Energy is funded by USAID with the support of the American people with a goal to help Egypt reach its target of 42% renewable energy by 2035 and position the country as a regional leader in clean energy. The center is operated by Arizona State University in partnership with three Egyptian universities: Ain Shams, Mansoura, and Aswan.
The U.S. Agency for International Development administers the U.S. foreign assistance program providing economic and humanitarian assistance in more than 80 countries worldwide.
This announcement is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of Center of Excellence for Energy and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.
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