Moroccan researchers Said Yaktin and Khalil Ben Haj Amin won the 41st Kuwait Award, granted by the Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Science (KFAS) to Arab scientists who have made remarkable scientific and intellectual contributions globally.
Yaqtin won the award in the field of “Human Science, Arts and Literature” on the theme “Literature and art in the Arab world – Specialization in narrative sciences”, to which 43 candidates applied, the Foundation said in a statement.
The Moroccan researcher, a professor at the Faculty of Letters and Human Sciences of the Mohammed V University of Rabat, was crowned in recognition of his research in the field of narrative, literary theory, critical literature, Arab-Islamic narrative heritage and popular culture.
For his part, Khalil Ben Haj Amin, who leads the battery technology team at the Argonne National Laboratory of the US Department of Energy, won the award in the field of “applied sciences” on the theme “clean and sustainable energy technologies”, to which 30 applicants applied, in recognition of his research in the field of battery technology and his pioneering contribution to the applied sciences of clean and sustainable energy technology.
In the field of medical sciences, the “Human Genetics” award went to Saudi researcher Faouzan Sami Al-Kurai, while “Economic, Financial and Banking Sciences – Specialization in Econometrics” was awarded to Lebanese researcher Elie Tamer, who currently serves as a professor at Harvard University.
The award of “science and technology of nanomaterials and their applications” was gleaned by Tunisian researcher Mohamed Alhadi Omar Almatoussi, professor of chemistry and biochemistry at the University of Florida.
The Kuwait Award was established in 1979 in fulfillment of KFAS’s strategy to support scientific research and encourage scholars and researchers in Kuwait and all other Arab countries.