AUS and RTI to mobilize collaboration

Delegates from RTI International (Research Triangle Institute) visited American University of Sharjah (AUS) yesterday, March 27, 2013. The visit was a follow-up to a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed last year between the two institutions.

With the MoU, the two entities agreed to pursue collaboration in environmental sciences, including public health projects and air pollution projects and monitoring. The meeting yesterday explored ways to mobilize the MoU to start joint projects between AUS faculty and RTI researchers. Potential projects were discussed particularly in the field of environmental research such as particulate matter pollution and collaboration between the Department of Physics and RTI. Further meetings will be held to discuss technical details of the projects.

Dr. Thomas John Hochstettler, AUS Acting Chancellor and Provost; Dr. Mark Rush, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences; Dr. Leland Blank, Interim Dean, College of Engineering and Dr. Nasser Hamdan, Interim Head, Department of Physics, met with the RTI delegation that included Dr. Janet Mitchel, Vice President, Social Policy, Health and Economics Research; Glenn Whaley, Senior Environmental Scientist; Robert Zerbonia, Project Manager; and Mahmoud Taha, Director of Business Development Social, Statistical and Environmental Sciences.

"The collaboration between AUS and RTI will lead to enhancing our research capabilities and will enable us to expand our projects beyond the academic laboratories," said Dr. Hamdan. "For example, we will expand our particulate matter air pollution project that we had been working on for few years to include quantitative speciation size effect, source appointment and health impact of air pollutants to cover the whole UAE and maybe Qatar."

Headquartered in North Carolina, USA, RTI International is one of the world's leading research institutes, dedicated to improving the human condition by turning knowledge into practice and providing research and technical services to governments and businesses in more than 75 countries in the areas of health and pharmaceuticals, education and training, surveys and statistics, advanced technology, international development, economic and social policy, energy and the environment, and laboratory testing and chemical analysis.