ADU launched its 8th undergraduate research competition, the largest in the Arab world, to support its Learning through Research Initiative, which aims to foster an enquiry-based culture among students in support of the development of future work skills. This year's competition focuses on ideation to commercialization. For the first time, competition participants had the opportunity to transform their creativity from ideation to possible commercialization. A panel of experts evaluated each entry's potential for commercialization. Five successful teams joined the 2021 Launchpad cohort and will receive expert mentoring, access to ADU's incubation facilities, financial support for start-up licensing costs, and an AED 10,000 cash injection to support their business plan.
Two student teams from Agriculture – FAFS won the competition and were selected among the winning teams as 2nd and 3rd places.
FAFS student team I: AbdelRazzak Doughan, Youssef Saadeh, and Georges Rahal. Their research project qualified for the 8th Undergraduate Virtual Research Competition on May 19, at Abu Dhabi University. The team was awarded 2nd place for their project: Combining Aquaculture and Agriculture for Food Security. The project is supervised by Drs. Saoud and Haidar and assisted by Ms. Bridget Ireland, a graduate student funded by the Conservation, Food & Health Foundation, GMA Foundations, Boston, MA, USA. The Team 1 project video is available here.
FAFS student team II: Al Amine Bantan (coordinator), Mustafa Shbaro, Ibrahim Mneimneh and Abbas Madani. Team II placed third for their project: Urban Agriculture. Team II established 4 urban agriculture systems: a verticulture unit, a hydroponics unit, a hydrotower, and a greenbox, and a conventional unit. The team compared various agricultural aspects (weed invasion, water consumption, productivity, pests, and others). They concluded that urban agriculture systems can be a key component in the food supply chain and can help cities produce their own vegetables in a sustainable eco-friendly way. Team II's video is available here.
Both teams were exceptional and worked very hard on their project, part of AGSC 223 course in summer 2019 To watch the full video of the Undergraduate Virtual Research Competition, click here
