“Competition in itself encourages creativity and creativity is the basis of knowledge” – Farouk El-Baz
Dr. Farouk El-Baz is an Egyptian-American space scientist and geologist. He earned his B.Sc. in chemistry and geology at Ain Shams University in Cairo (1958) and further earned his Ph.D. in geology at the University of Missouri at Rolla (1964). In 1967, El-Baz began work at NASA, where he played the primary role in determining the ideal Moon landing site for the Apollo 11 mission. Much later in his career, he joined Boston University to research the geology of Earth (1986). El-Baz used satellite images to understand the origins of deserts and as a result, uncovered many sand-buried rivers and streams in the Sahara. This analysis was used to identify the location of groundwater in the deserts of Egypt, Oman, the UAE, and Sudan. His numerous honors include being a Senior Advisor to Egypt’s former president Hosni Mubarak and being elected a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering in Washington, DC (2002).