College of the North Atlantic-Qatar

While working as a biology instructor at CNA-Q (Doha, Qatar) from 2007-2009, I was lucky to have the opportunity to conduct two applied research projects.  Both projects were funded by Qatar Foundation's Undergraduate Research Experience Programme (UREP).  Total funds amounted to 141, 306USD. 

The first project, Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Sustainable Management of Desert Truffles in Qatar involved conducting a series of nation wide interviews about desert truffles.  We learned many interesting things, such as the fact that 71% of Qatar's national population hunts for truffles.  We also had the opportunity to travel to Finland to present our results at the Juva Truffle Centre. 

The second project, Bioprospecting Qatar's Plant Genetic Resources involved surveying Qatar's flora for plants to treat both environmental degradation and diseases of affluence.  We wrote a book through that project called From Acacia to Ziziphus: Arabian Plants to Nourish the Body and Earth. 


This exciting project involved 6 students and 2 faculty members and we also conducted a stakeholder's meeting to disseminate our results and presented at the Society for Ethnobiology's 32nd Annual conference in New Orleans, Louisiana.  Part of that project also involved setting up an online social network so that the students could collaborate with researchers online from other parts of the world (http://teknetwork.ning.com/).

I was also interviewed on CBC International ('The Link' with Mark Montgomery).  Here is the link to that audio file, please skip to minute 13:52

http://www.rcinet.ca/radio/index.php?language=en&type=program&media=audio2&id=401