| RIYADH — A research chair at King Saud University has been established in the name of Grameen Bank of Bangladesh founder Mohammed Yunus, who won the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2006. Yunus was in the Kingdom yesterday for the Jeddah Economic Forum. Fayez A. Al-Ghamdi, assistant professor of English at the College of Arts of King Saud University, said that the university has decided to establish the research chair as part of its R&D program. "There will be 15 international scholarships under his name," said Al-Ghamdi. The Nobel laureates will serve as part-time faculty members at KSU, where they will make their own contribution to various programs in the university. Some of them participated in workshops on nanotechnology as well as the international conference on knowledge-based economy. They also provided valuable input in scientific programs and conferences, including the 7th Saudi Engineering Conference held in November last year. He said the research program was set up almost six months ago and was intended to forge strategic alliances with prestigious international scholars. "With this in view, we started contacting tens of Nobel laureates during August and September last year with the support of 25 sponsors," he said. "Five of the Nobel laureates have visited KSU and four of them signed service contracts with its rector, Dr. Abdullah Al-Othman." Al-Ghamdi said that in the second semester the university would have eight laureates, with the number set to increase to 14 this year. "We have contacted 25 Nobel laureates," he said. "Through this program we would like to reap the benefit of their rich experience and expertise by sponsoring joint research projects in scientific fields." The second objective, he pointed out, was to set up a training program for KSU's new faculty for nanotechnology. In addition, they will supervise post-doctoral and sabbatical research programs. All of these were part of the agreement signed with the Nobel laureates. Al-Ghamdi said the laureates would be connected to their own scientific fields through the university's various departments. The university will send another delegation from faculty members to visit the Nobel laureate's own university and get an idea of the research programs. In some cases, the students could also be trained there as well. He said there would also be a student-exchange program. | 
