Qatar Foundation Annual Research Forum Volume 2010 Issue 1

Abstract Facies tracts, sediment types, stacking patterns, and diagenetic histories of Holocene sabkhas of Qatar provide compelling analogues for the interpretation of ancient, carbonate-evaporite sequences of the Arabian Plate. The use of modern analogues to aid in the interpretation of geological and engineering data is well established in the petroleum industry. Comparison of sabkhas from different physiographic regio Read More

Abstract Biodiversity conservation attracts much attention all over the world, highlighted in 2010, the United Nation's International Year of Biodiversity. Effective biodiversity conservation needs basic biological and environmental information, including the behavior and ecology of organisms. The Ethiopian hedgehog (Paraechinus aethiopicus), which is well adapted to the desert environment, is a common species in Read More

Abstract Carbon monoxide (CO) and volatile organic compounds (VOC), such as butadiene and isoprene, are air pollutants emitted by many industrial sources, such as burning of wood and fuel with poor ventilation, and by natural sources including forest fires or volcanic eruptions. It was found that these compounds are also significantly abundant in many industrial processes. Therefore, low-temperature catalytic oxidatio Read More

Abstract Date palms are generally propagated by separating the offshoots produced by individual trees. This method maintains the genetic integrity of date palm cultivars. However, well known date palm cultivars that are grown in different environments show little differences in fruit morphology and quality such as color and sweetness. The objective of the present research project is to analyze the genetic diversity among most c Read More

Abstract Qatar's soil and environment are sources of beneficial bacterial strains and bacterial resources that should be first of all, identified, isolated, studied, used and valorized. In fact, the Qatari environment should be elective for many microbial genetic resources tolerant to high temperature, drought, salinity and hydrocarbon rich soil. Isolating microbial strains having biotechnological applications would be very b Read More

Abstract In 2007, 2,500,000 tons of waste in Qatar was disposed of on the Umalafai landfill, of which 700,000 tons constituted domestic waste, However, only 4600 tons of this waste was discharged to be recycled, and of this 149 tons was paper waste. This high amount of waste paper in 2007, when the population of Qatar was 907,229 means that there should be even more waste as the population reached 1,900,000 in Read More

Abstract Date palm is the most important fruit tree in Qatar. Recently developed techniques, based on DNA markers, offer new tools for genetic analysis. The objectives of the present study are to analyze the genetic diversity among 15 different cultivars of date palm at the experimental farm of Qatar University using ISSR and SSR markers, and find out the genetic similarity and/or diversity among the well known date pal Read More

Abstract This study, carried out in the Qatar Carbonates and Carbon Storage Research Centre (QCCSRC) at Imperial College focuses on the interplay between fractures, diagenetic fluid flow and precipitation of diagenetic minerals in an exposed carbonate carapace of a salt dome in Oman. Understanding fault-related mineralization and the differences between diagenesis in the fractures and fracture walls compared Read More