Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane - Spotlights

Spotlights

AUI faculty to Attend AT-SGIRES EU Training Conference

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11.29.2018

In February, Dr. Ahmed Khallaayoun and Dr. Mhammed Chraibi will be representing Al Akhawayn University at the Advanced Teaching and Training on Smart Grid and Grid Integration of Renewable Energy Systems (AT-SGIRES) group meeting. AT-SGIRES aims to to introduce the topic of Smart Grid and Grid Integrated Systems to the curricula of undergraduate and postgraduate programs in different MENA and EU universities, and to deepen the understanding of the smart grid projects and grid connected system among the communities, working force and university renewable energy faculty members and graduates in the MENA region. In addition to this, AT-SGIRES aims to improve of the quality of renewable energy integration and smart grid courses offered in partner universities, develop and implement more easily accessible online teaching modules in the field of smart grid and integration of renewable energy sources, enhance cooperation amongst Jordanian, Moroccan and Syrian Universities and EU Universities the field of smart grid technology and grid connected systems and to build the capacities of the university teaching staff in partner universities through training workshops and exchange activities. 

 
In addition, they will attend a conference/workshop about smart grid technology. While the teaching materials generally target graduate and postgraduate students, the training courses are designed to train the teachers involved in the process as well. The teaching modules will be prepared by the project partners in close cooperation with industrial stockholders. AUI, along with 6 other universities from England, Germany, Cyprus, Jordan, and Syria, is part of the consortium. 
 
For more details on the project, click the following link: http://www.meu.edu.jo/sites/atsgires/

Maghrebi Relations: Dr. Lounnas and Dr. Messari Publish Paper for MENARA Project

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11.27.2018

Dr. Djallil Lounnas and Dr. Nizzar Messari have once again co-authored a new paper that was published as a part of the Middle East and North Africa Research Architecture papers (MENARA), a research program which aims to spread light on the historical, political, economic and social dynamics that are affecting the Middle East and North Africa. The paper, titled "Algeria-Morocco Relations and Their Impact on the Maghrebi Regional System", is based on interviews conducted in Algeria and Morocco and looks at the key issues over which the two states disagree, the divergent narratives on those issues, and the modes of overcoming them. The paper also examines how these differences impact the stability of the North-African-Sahelian regional system. 

The publication can be accessed by the following link:

http://www.iai.it/en/pubblicazioni/algeria-morocco-relations-and-their-impact-maghrebi-regional-system 

 

Dr. El Hajjaji Publishes Paper on Water Treatment

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11.14.2018

Dr. Samir El Hajjaji, Assistant Professor of Chemistry in the School of Science and Engineering (SSE), recently co-authored a paper with Dr. Asmaa Msaad of the Chemistry and Environment Laboratory at University Hassan I in Settat that was published in Desalination and Water Treatment, a scientific journal dedicated to the research and application of integrated water management, water reuse, wastewater and related topics. The journal is indexed by Web of Science, SCI-E and Current Contents, and its 2018 impact factor is rated at 1.38. The paper, titled "Industrial Wastewater Decolorization by Activated Carbon from Ziziphus Lotus", reports the application of novel low-cost and eco-friendly adsorbent made from leaves of jujube, a shrub species commonly found in Morocco. With this new type of activated carbon, color in wastewater taken from a Moroccan jeans factory can be reduced by more than 97% in only 5 hours. 

An abstract of the published paper can be accessed through the following link:

http://www.deswater.com/DWT_abstracts/vol_126/126_2018_296.pdf

AUI Students Give Presentation on Morocco's Culinary History in Switzerland

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11.09.2018
AUI has once again displayed its institutional standard of excellence and international reach. From the 31st of October until the 4th of November, two AUI students, Sara El Fatihi and Manal Belcadi, and an AUI Alumna, Marwa Oulad Touimi, presented their research under the supervision of Ms. Afifa El Bayed, a guest lecturer in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences (SHSS), in the European Communication Research and Education Association's conference (ECREA) in Lugano, Switzerland. This was the 7th conference held by the ECREA, which is one of the top three communication science conferences worldwide. Its participants tend to be communication scholars with years of experience, with some exceptions being PhD candidates. The theme of this year's conference was centered around "Centres and Peripheries: Communication, Research, Translation" in communication addressed from a multiplicity of perspectives. 
 
The students and alumna, under the supervision of Ms. Afifa El Bayed, gave their presentation on "International Communication Exchange and the Heterogenous Disjuncture Shaping Moroccan Culture", on which they also published a paper. Per the abstract of the paper, the research done "...traces the evolution of Moroccan gastronomy throughout history under the influence of cross-cultural interactions. It unearths the communities and cultures intervening in molding the Moroccan cuisine across time until today. It further singles out personal and meditated communication exchanges behind the progression of the Moroccan culinary art." They also presented a poster on "The Developmental Approach Towards Global Cultural Promotion: The Case of North African Moroccan Amazighs."
Ms. El Fatihi, Ms. Belcadi, Ms. Touimi and Ms. El Bayed all represented Al Akhawayn tremendously at the conference, which saw an attendance of more than 1300 international participants this year. 
 

Islam and Science: Dr. Bigliardi Presents New Book in Switzerland

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11.08.2018

On Sunday, November 4th, Dr. Stefano Bigliardi, a Professor in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at AUI, presented his recent Italian book on pseudoscience in the Muslim world in Lugano, Switzerland. His book titled "La Mezzaluna e la Luna Dimezzata: Islam, Pseudoscienza e Paranormale", which translates to "The Crescent Moon and the Half Moon: Islam, Pseudoscience and Paranormal", was recently published by the Italian Committee for the Investigation of Claims of the Pseudosciences (CICAP).

In an interview with the Italian-language newspaper, Corriere del Ticino, on October 30th, Dr. Bigliardi spoke about the focus of the book being surrounded around the idea of "scientific miracle" in the Quran, and how the employment of this concept in the modern Muslim world has become more and more popular. In the interview, Dr. Bigliardi claimed, "It is based on the exaggeration of the alleged accuracy with which these phenomena would be described. The supporters of the so-called scientific miracle exaggerate the accuracy, claiming that it was not within the reach of a human observer at the time of revelation. And if the phenomenon is described with that precision, it is clear that information must come only from God." An example of this is given as well, as he states," we must take into consideration that the Quran is written in a very ancient Arabic language, with polysemantic terms that can therefore be translated in various ways. One of these is mudgha, which literally means "small pile of chewed meat." (Proponents of the scientific miracle) claim that this description of the pile of chewed meat corresponds exactly to a precise initial stage in the development of the human embryo. There are hyper-simplifications in progress. In some cases it is unknown that the specific information was already available to men and women of the time of the profession. And then you exaggerate with the precision of the Quranic language, trying to attribute to it a precision that science has reached only in our days. Moreover, the supporters of the scientific miracle must, by necessity, ignore all the other passages of the book which, if taken to the letter, are in contradiction with science. In the verse according to which God created the Earth by stretching it, the same verb is used that is used for carpets. It would therefore seem that the Quran gives a ‘flat earth’ reading of the phenomenon. If one wants to maintain that the Quran is always accurate from the scientific point of view, one must make a selective reading and exaggerate its presumed precision."