Qatar has discovered two new planets and have named them Qatar 2b and 2c ! There is an increased awareness on Astronomical studies from the market and young Qataris are being encouraged to take interest and advantage of the country’s Science and technology development. For more information on this contact us at info@intelligentgulf.com

1. Qatar
discovers
two new
planets
By Peter Townson StaniD their eyes
Staff Reporter
The fu ture of space exploration In
Qatar will depend on the Interest of
Ql tar's name is to be written in
the stars once more this year, as
wo new planets discovered by a
Qatan -led team of explorers are set to
young Qataris who wish to learn more
abou llhe subject and take advantage
of the country's focus on science,
tecl"mology and development, Director
be officially announced in September. for researc h co-ordination and cornpli­
According to the founder of the Qa­ ance at Qatar Founoation's research
tar Exoplanet Survey (QES), Khalid division, and founrJer of the Qatar
al-Subai, the programme which dis­ Exoplanet Survey CQESl. Khalid alSubai
covered the 'Qatar lb' planet last year, said, PageS
has found two new planets to be named
'Qatar 2b' and 'Qatar 2c!
The programme is an extrasolar wait befat e Ir.~king the announcement.
planets searching project which em­ He explained that the multi-million
ploys the transit method, with a team dollar project, based in New Mexico,
made up of experts from universi­ would be expanded in the future with
ties including Harvard, St Andrew's, attempts to determine whether life
Leicester, Keele and other institutions. is supported on the planets that have
"We already have one discovery been discovered.
which we announced at the end of If the team can determine what ele­
2010:' he said, adding "the good news ments are present on the planet, such
is that we will have another one, which as methane and oxygen, then they can
should be announced mid - September!' move closer to establishing whether
The planets are unrelated to last life could be supported.
year's discovery and connected to to­ Al-Subai is passionate about astron­
tally different stars, he explained. omy, and his love for exploration is im­
Al-Subai, who is also director of mediately obvious when discussing his
research co-ordination and compli­ team's work.
ance at Qatar Foundation'S research He claims that this kind of advance­
division, explained that the official an­ ment is contributing towards a renais­
nouncement regarding the discoveries sance in Arab science and technology,
will be made later this year. harking back to previous achievements.
"When we found one planet, we dis­ "If you look at any astronomy cata­
covered that it was not obeying normal logue, many of the bright star's names
rules - there was a delay and shift in are Arabic, but unfortunately many peo­
the orbit that told us there was a sec­ ple do not know this;' he said, adding
0nd body there:' he said, "therefore we "now it's our turn to come back again and
needed more time to follow up!' put Arabic names bac;k in the sky!'
Further exploration will be re­ Not everyone was as enthusiastic
quired to determine whether there about the QES naming programme,
are other similar planets in this explained al-Subai, who said that his
new system, but al-Subai said team faced opposition before getting
that the QES team did not wish to the International Astronomical Union '
to approve the 'Qatar lb' name.
However, the name stands, and the
future of the programme could see it
expand into South Africa, Chile, the
Canary Islands and even Iran, who have
expressed an interest in hosting an ex­
ploration site.
"This kind of research has never been
done in the Islamic world; we are hop­
Khalid al-Subal whose QES programme ing to collaborate with our neighbours
has discovered two new planets. and push forward;' noted al- Subai.
,---. ~-

2. Young Qataris 'need to be
inspired' ilJtQ astronomy
By Peter Townson
Staff Reporter
e future of space explo­
TI ration in Qatar will de ­
pend on the interest of
young Qataris who wish to learn
more about the subject and take
advantage of the country's focus
on science, technology and de ­
velopment, a leading local sci­
entist has srud.
Director for research co - ordi ­
nation and compliance at Qatar
Foundation's research division,
and founder of the Qatar Exo­
planet Survey (QES) , Kllalid al ­
Subru srud that he hopes to in­
spire young Qataris to pursue the
necessary education to "build
a new generation of Qatari as ­
tronomers'~
"Our plan is to expand ... and
expansion needs more people to
work - I cannot handJei t all my­
self:' he srud, adding limy plan is
to t rain some more Qataris!'
Astronomy for young people
and children is the "best en­
trance to science:' he srud, add­
, ing "if you want to get young
, people excited about science,
then you should tell t hem about
astronomy!'
Unfortunately, Qatar does not
provide a suitable environment
for conducting programmes
such as the QES and research
data has to be collected overseas.
"Qatar is a flat country, and we
like mountains!" said al-Subai,
adding "but that's all right ­
many professional astronomers
live in Europe where it is cloudy One of the Items of equipment used by t he Qatar Exoplanet Survey.
most of the time, but they are
producing good science!' my observation station inNew Mexico tion here. If you want to do science the scientific and astronomic fields will depend on others following his
"We go to the best locations (in the US) is robotic - we set it up this you have to put it in the rightlocation;' - something he hopes will continue p ioneering footsteps and involving
around t he world and we do the way and we get the data through the AJ- Subai believes Qatar is reas ­ for many years. themselves in programmes such as
science:' he noted. "For instance, Internet so we can read the informa- serting the Arab world's influence in However, as he points out, this his own.