• 2020

⇒ERSC Department Newsletter 2020 

Student competition

Contributed by Mohammed Farfour

Our student team has secured 2nd place in the 2020 Imperial Barrel Award (IBA) competition held online on March 16. The IBA is an international competition for students in petroleum geosciences, organized by the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG). Eleven universities from the Gulf region have participated this year, including King Fahd University, King Abdulaziz University, Lebanese University, Kuwait University, United Arab Emirates University, Petroleum Institute of Abu-Dhabi (Khalifa University), Hashemite University, Al-Albeit University, University of Basrah, Yarmouk University. The university team consisted of Azza Al-Hasani, Badour Al-Adawi, Mohammed Al-Shukaili, Al-Julandaa Al-Gulandani. The team was under the supervision of Dr. Mohammed Farfour.

Link to the AAPG website with photos: https://iba.aapg.org/competition/past/2020/middleeast

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From left to right Badour Al-Adawi, Al-Julandaa Al-Gulandani, Dr. Mohammed Farfour, Mohammed Al-Shukaili, Azza Al-Hasani.


New book by Dr. Rifaat Abdalla translated into 8 languages

Contributed by Rifaat Abdallah

Dr. Rifaat Abdalla has recently co-authored a book entitled “Advanced Remote Sensing Concepts” as the first author (ISBN 9786200439499). It is published by the German  Lambert Academic Publishing (https://www.lap-publishing.com/catalogue/details/gb/978-620-0-43949-9/advanced-remote-sensing-concepts). The original English version of the book was translated by the publisher into 8 languages which are, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Russian, Italian, and Polish language.

The German version rifaat
The German Version Dr. Rifaat Abdallah

 


New book by Dr. Andreas Scharf et al. (Preview)

Contributed by Andreas Scharf

Dr. Andreas Scharf, Prof. Frank Mattern, Dr. Mohammed Al-Wardi (former SQU), Dr. Gianluca Frijia (former SQU), Dr. Daniel Moraetis (former SQU), Dr. Bernhard Pracejus, Dr. Wilfried Bauer (GUtech), and Dr. Ivan Callegari (GUtech) will publish a comprehensive review book about the geology of the eastern Oman Mountains. This work includes an outsized geological map and a comprehensive time/event and stratigraphic chart. The expected day of publication is the 1st of March 2021. The publisher is the Geological Society of London (GSL Memoirs 54; https://www.geolsoc.org.uk/M0054).

New book by Dr. Andreas Scharf


International Conference on Ophiolites and the Oceanic Lithosphere

Contributed by Sobhi Nasir

An international conference was organized by the College of Science – Prof. Sobhi Nasir UNESCO Chair of Ophiolite studies during 12-14 January 2020. The conference was entitled “International Conference on Ophiolites and the Oceanic Lithosphere: Results of the Oman Drilling Project and Related Research”. The conference was attended by approximately 200 participants from 40 countries. The main themes, discussed at the conference, were the following:

Results of the Oman Drilling Project. ophiolite genesis and the oceanic lithosphere, geodynamics and hydrothermal processes of ophiolites at spreading ridges, chemical and physical processes within oceanic magma chambers, formation of ore deposits related to ophiolites CO2 sequestration, fluids and diagenesis within the oceanic crust, geochemical cycles, and geobiological studies related to ocean crust formation, tectonics of emplacement and metamorphism, hydrogeology of ophiolites, subsurface microbial ecosystems in gabbro and peridotite. The conference covered 40 oral sessions and 92 poster presentations. The conference was followed by six field trips to different parts of the Samail Ophiolite.

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The Second International Conference on Water Resources in Arid Areas 2020” (WRAA2020)

Contributed by Osman Abdalla

The Second International Conference on Water Resources in Arid Areas 2020” (WRAA2020) was held from 9th to 11th November 2020 via Zoom Webinar with a major contribution from the Earth Sciences Department. The Water Research Center at Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) jointly with the Ministry of Agricultural and Fisheries Wealth and Water Resources organized the conference. Prof. Osman Abdalla from the Earth Sciences Department has chaired the conference and the Department’s Head Dr. Talal Al-Hosni has been actively involved as a member of both the organizing and scientific committees.

In the presence of H.H. Sayyid Dr. Fahad Bin Al-Julanda Al Said, the Vice-Chancellor of Sultan Qaboos University, and a large number of researchers, scientists, water professionals, and students, H.E. Dr. Saud Bin Hamoud Al-Habsi, the Minister of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries Wealth, and Water Resources patronaged the opening ceremony. The welcome address was given by Prof. Osman Abdalla, the Chairman of the organizing committee, followed by H.E. Dr. Saud Bin Hamoud Al-Habsi's speech.

A total of 602 conference participants joined the zoom conference, including 6 distinguished keynote speakers from renowned international universities and institutions (along with 2 keynote speakers from Oman). The conference featured 10 sessions, 36 oral papers and 18 posters (8 min presentation for each poster). A special session was devoted to the Water Strategic Research program that is organized by the Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation (MHERI) and His Majesty’s Higher Center for Culture and Science.

The conference papers covered a wide range of topics including subsurface hydrology, salinization and irrigation practices, climate change and water resources, economics and management of wastewater, water desalination and purification technologies, aflaj and traditional water systems, hydroinformatics, and urban water, with a special theme on water-use and production in greenhouses.

The scientific committee of the conference had received and reviewed 224 abstracts and 82 full manuscripts. A conference Editorial Board managed the reviewing process, ranked papers based on their quality, and recommended the top 20 manuscripts to be considered for publication in two special issues with two international journals (Scopus indexed). The first issue is entitled “Advances in arid areas water research” with the Journal "Earth Systems and Environment", and the second issue is entitled “Sustainable Water Resources in Arid Areas” with the “Journal of Arid Land”. The 31 second-tier papers were published in a Refereed Springer Book and will be out soon (ISBN 978-3-030-67027-6). The abstracts of all accepted papers were published by SQU and distributed to all registered participants as a part of the conference package. The final recommendations of the conference have been sent out to the organizations of concern. In a recognition of their papers’ quality, a conference jury has awarded prizes to the best-selected papers (oral and posters) including prizes for young scientists.

In a new experience during the COVID-19 pandemic, the conference was successfully held via Zoom Webinar, which paves the road for future online events that will minimize organizationally, expenditures, efforts, and time.

Osman


Re-accreditation by the Geological Society (London)

Contributed by Frank Mattern

Despite the Corona Crisis we managed to collect various data sets needed to apply for reaccreditation of our undergraduate programs in Earth Sciences and Geophysics before the set deadline. During November 2020, we submitted our application for international re-accreditation by the Geological Society (London). It is presently being evaluated.

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Academic Promotion

Contributed by Frank Mattern

Dr. Andreas Scharf was promoted to Associate Professor, while Drs. Osman Abdalla and Frank Mattern were promoted to Full Professor.   

Andreas SCHARF | Professor (Associate) | Dr. | Sultan Qaboos University,  Muscat | SQU | Department of Earth Science

 

Dr. Andreas Scharf

 

Academic-Staff

 

Prof. Osman Abdalla

 

Prof. Frank Mattern

 


New software licenses

Contributed by Salah Al Khirbash and Mohammed Farfour

The Earth Sciences Department received 20 free licenses for Micromine software. Micromine software allows geoscientists, mining geologists, and engineers to manage, model, estimate a wide spectrum of mining processes, from the first step of data collection and mineral exploration and commodity estimates to the final stages of mine design setup and exploitation.

The Earth Sciences Department has received 15 academic licenses of Geomage g-Platform™ (www.geomage.com/software), the most innovative and advanced package for seismic data processing. Geomage is a leading software provider of innovative solutions in seismic processing and imaging. The donation of Geomage is a part of its academic license program for educational purposes. It will allow our students to practice seismic data processing not only in the classroom but also on their personal computers running either Windows or Linux.

 

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