Nazek El-Atab is an Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Principal investigator of the Smart, Advanced Memory devices and Applications lab (SAMA) at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia. Her research interest focuses on the design and fabrication of smart memory and electronic devices and their applications.

Education and early career

Dr. Nazek El-Atab received her B.Sc. degree in Computer and Communications Engineering from the Hariri Canadian University, Lebanon, in 2012, her M.Sc. degree in Microsystems Engineering from the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology, Abu Dhabi, UAE, in 2014, and her Ph.D. degree in Interdisciplinary Engineering from the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology in 2017, under a cooperative program with the MIT and funded by the US Office of Naval Research. During her Ph.D., she worked as a visiting researcher with Prof. Krishna Saraswat at Stanford University. Prior to joining KAUST as an Assistant Professor in ECE, she was a Research Scientist at KAUST.

Areas of expertise and current scientific interests

Dr. El-Atab’s research interest focuses on the design and fabrication of smart memory and electronic devices and their applications, including in-memory computing and in-memory sensing.

Career Recognition

Dr. El-Atab has received several awards for her research, including 2015 For Women in Science Middle East Fellowship by L’Oreal-UNESCO, the 2016 IEEE Nanotechnology Student Travel Award, the 2017 International Rising Talents Award by L’Oreal-UNESCO, the 2018 “Hariri Canadian University” Alumni Award, and was portrayed in the 2019 “Remarkable Women in Technology” by UNESCO. Dr. El-Atab was also selected to participate in the 70th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting in Germany. Dr. El-Atab has also been selected among the 2020 UC Berkeley EECS Rising Stars and among the 10 Innovators under 35 by MIT Technology Review Arabia, 2020. Her research has been highlighted extensively in international media including in IEEE Spectrum, National Geographic, BBC, MIT Technology Review, Sky News Arabia, MBC, etc.

Professional and editorial activities

Dr. El-Atab is a Senior IEEE Member and currently serves as the Chair of the Western Saudi Arabia IEEE Electron Device Society Chapter. She is currently serving as an Associate Editor at the Nano Select journal by Wiley and as a Review Editor at the Flexible Electronics journal by Frontiers in Electronics. She has published over 26 papers in international peer-reviewed scientific journals, 40 conference presentations, 2 book chapters, 2 books, and has 7 filed U.S. patents.