Entry Date:
August 27, 2015

Ibn Khaldun Fellowship

Principal Investigator John Lienhard


The Ibn Khaldun Fellowship program allows Saudi Arabian women with PhDs to conduct research with MIT faculty.

This competitive fellowship program is open to Saudi Arabian women scientists and engineers who hold a doctoral degree. Fellows are supported to spend one year doing research at MIT in collaboration with an MIT faculty member. The program is administered at MIT through the Center for Clean Water and Clean Energy.

The Ibn Khaldun Fellowship for Saudi Arabian women was launched in collaboration with KFUPM and other Saudi universities, with two Saudi Arabian women professors in residence at MIT during the 2012-13 academic year. KFUPM sponsored the AY12-13 fellows and will sponsor two more during 2013-2015.

Saudi Aramco has supported the expansion of the program by establishing the “Saudi Aramco Ibn Khaldun Fellowship for Saudi Women”, administrated jointly by the Center for Clean Water and Clean Energy and Saudi Aramco. This 5-year program hosts between 5 and 10 fellows at MIT each year. MIT admitted the first five Aramco sponsored fellows during fall 2013. This first cohort of Saudi Aramco Ibn Khaldun Fellows are drawn from two Saudi universities and Saudi Aramco, and cover diverse fields of engineering, science, and architecture.