Woods Hole with partnership in Saudi Arabia

Tor-Eddie Fossbakk The MOU creates three primary research areas: Coral reefs, coastal hydrography, and fisheries and aquaculture. WHOI will also provide consultation on the design of laboratory support, and dock facilities for the KAUST Marine and Ocean Research Center. It will provide opportunities for advanced research on the Red Sea oceanography and marine life. The proposed coral reef systems research project will focus on corals and reef fish and provide critical information for the protection and sustainable use of coral reef ecosystems along the Saudi coast in the northern and central Red Sea. The goal of the proposed three-year fisheries and aquaculture project will be to develop an integrated bio-economic model of the Red Sea along Saudi Arabia’s coastline that describes the dynamic relationships among fish stocks and the fisheries that harvest them. The coastal hydrographic and circulation project will establish a suite of observational and modeling activities that will provide the first comprehensive description of the physical oceanography in the Red Sea. According to Arab News online, The KAUST is being built as an international, graduate-level research university dedicated to inspiring a new era of scientific achievement in the Kingdom that will also benefit the region and the world. KAUST is the realization of a decades-long vision of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah. Its core campus, located on more than 36 million square meters on the Red Sea near Rabigh -- about 80 kilometers north of Jeddah -- is set to open in September 2009.