Facilities

Indoor Research Facilities at Qatar University Campus

The indoor research facilities, located at the Qatar University Campus, currently consist of five dedicated laboratories with state of the art equipment.

• BCR C123: Culture Collection & Cell Physiology: The primary lab houses the Qatar University Culture Collection of Cyanobacteria and Microalgae (QUCCCM). This is the main storage location for all the strains in the collection, as well as the location where new strain isolation takes place. Four main controlled (light, temperature and humidity) incubators house the solid media plates with near 200 strains isolated from the diversity of terrestrial, freshwater and marine habitats in Qatar. Two microscopes enable physiological verification of cell viability, purity and structure.
• BCR C129: Indoor Algae Cultivation & Photobioreactors: The second laboratory is dedicated to algae cultivation. In this laboratory environmental growth chambers, shaker incubators as well as 8 state of the art fully automated photo-bioreactors enable research into factors influencing and enhancing microalgae growth and cultivation.
• BCR C128: Screening, Analytical Biochemistry & Molecular Biology: The third laboratory focuses on the extraction and biochemical analysis of metabolites and valuable products from biomass. The facility has a comprehensive range of equipment to perform cell fractionation, purification of cell lipids, proteins, carbohydrates and metabolites. Compounds of interest are analyzed at the analytical and preparative scale. Opportunities include techniques as diverse as TLC, GC, HPLC, as well as high-end DNA sequence analysis.
• BCR C227: FEWWS Lab: New lab has been allocated for the Food-Water-Waste Sustainability Program. The Lab is dedicated to solid and liquid samples reception and processing including weighing, drying as well as routine analysis such as pH and EC, FW and DW measurements. This laboratory hosts 2 anaerobic continuously stirred tank reactors and 1 up-flow anaerobc filter for the study of anaerobic digestion and bioenergy production from multiple feedstocks such as microalgae, bio-sludge..etc. 
• BCR C225: Biotechnology Lab: This new lab has been allocated for Biotechnology Program. This lab is dedicated to microbiology work with the isolation, characterization, and identification of novel natural microorganisms from Qatar's extreme environment, such as bacteria, archaea, and fungi, to build the first Qatar biobank of extremophiles. Furthermore, several experiments on biomass production via fermentation, strain improvement via genetic engineering, and "in vitro bioassays" are performed in this Lab.

Experimental Greenhouse at Qatar University campus

An experimental plastic greenhouse of 90 m2 has been implemented at the vicinity of C01 building within QU campus to carry out different cultivation trials in hydroponics. This greenhouse has automated pad cooling and fertigation systems. The greenhouse contains 6 cultivation lines of 31 hydroponic containers each using cocopeat as substrate.

Outdoor Algae Research Facility

The outdoor research facility, located in Northern Qatar, was established for the research into large-scale outdoor cultivation of algae. The Pilot Facility consists of four scale-up sizes of open raceway ponds for algae cultivation. There are a total of fifteen open raceway ponds for algae cultivation, ranging from 200L to 100,000L. Furthermore, the facility contains storage for freshwater, seawater- and wastewater, an industrial standard water-sterilization unit, a basic laboratory for monitoring, as well as a high-end industrial centrifuge for biomass harvesting. The Pilot facility is a valuable resource that illustrates the potential for commercialization of the developed technologies, and is unique for Qatar and the region.  

Research labs at Ras Matbakh

The Aquaculture and Fisheries Research Station at Ras Matbakh, which is managed by the Ministry of Municipality, houses a number of laboratories which are being used by Qatar University. Three of the available labs have been allocated to the Center for Sustainable Development for the below activities:

• Culture Collection Lab: This lab will be for the Qatar University Culture Collection of Microalgae & Cyanobacteria and be used as a back-up location to reduce risk of strain loss. Currently, Algal Technology Program lab, at QU campus, is the only place where over 250 indigenous microalgae and cyanobacterial strains are stored. Considering the importance of these strains and the singular storage location, another backup location is required since there are risks of losing these strains due to calamity or any other unforeseen accidents. This lab will store these strains in both liquid and solid cultures as well as in liquid nitrogen at -80 ˚C.  Further, in case a sterile subculture of any of these strains is required for any project at the facility, these back up would be very useful. It is also expected that this lab will also be used for isolating new strains.
• Cultivation Lab: The second laboratory will be dedicated to small-scale cultivation experiments to: (1) compare the growth and metabolites production under specific growth conditions, (2) optimize the growth conditions (i.e., nutrients, light, salinity, etc.) of microalgae that will lead to the synthesis of any specific metabolites. This lab will also be used to monitor the metabolites productivity, biological contamination, and culture stability of the Algae Production Facility.
• Downstream Processing Lab: The third laboratory will be used for characterizing and downstream processing of the biomass. After harvesting the biomass, the cellular composition of the biomass (i.e., terms of protein, lipid, carbohydrate, different pigments content) will be quantified. This lab have facilities to (1) extract and purify multiple high-value metabolites of interest from the biomass, and (2) valorize the biomass.