​-By David Murphy, KAUST News

Qurrat-Ul-Ain Nadeem describes herself as a highly goal-oriented workaholic who loves meeting people from diverse backgrounds, reading and traveling. Nadeem is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in electrical engineering with a research focus on developing multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) technology for 5G communication systems and is a member of the KAUST Communication Theory Lab (CTL).

Nadeem, who completed her master's degree in electrical engineering at KAUST in 2015, holds a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from the School of Science and Engineering (SSE) at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), Pakistan. Upon completing her undergraduate degree at LUMS, Nadeem was offered fully funded Ph.D. scholarships from Cornell University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, but she opted to continue her academic training at KAUST.

"The cultural and ethnic diversity at KAUST was very exciting for a young person like me, but, to be honest, I was more interested in the research opportunities made available to me on this lovely campus. The research focus of KAUST is unlike any other graduate school in the world. I was also excited to be a part of a new university where I would be able to make a bigger impact," Nadeem said.

Time at KAUST

Nadeem believes that her experience at KAUST has been more than she could have expected beforehand. KAUST has offered her excellent networking opportunities—not only in her own research field but also in other areas of scientific research.

"The opportunity to learn from world-class professors and researchers has been amazing, and working with my peers has also been a great learning experience. I am very much proud of the fact that I took advantage of this opportunity and have managed to publish four journal papers already in IEEE journals," she said.

"I find the discussions with people from other disciplines to be incredibly valuable. It is amazing to learn about what is happening in the fields of bioscience, chemistry, physics and mathematics and to see how everything fits together in the bigger picture. KAUST is a great example of how humanity can come together and move forward," Nadeem added.

Future plans

The opportunity to meet several amazing researchers and industrial peers working with 5G technology all over the world has emboldened Nadeem's hope to continue her research work with colleagues at a more advanced level.

"I believe that my work is really useful in taking 5G technology from theory to practice. It would be amazing if I could actually see it working in the real world in the near future," she concluded.

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