ABU DHABI: Masdar Institute of Science and Technology announced on Monday that one of its graduate students and member of the Young Future Energy Leaders (YFEL) programme will be participating in a five-day course on sustainable transport in Finland.

Mohamed Al Sharhan of the Engineering Systems and Management Programme at Masdar Institute is the only student from the UAE who will be participating in the Helsinki Summer School for Transportation 2012. Scheduled to be held from  August 13-18 at Aalto University, Helsinki, it will be themed “Concepts and Practices about Sustainability in Transportation.”

The Summer School is intended for transportation professionals, managers in transport agencies, transport and traffic engineers, planners, consultants, citizen advocates, educators and graduate students.

A visit to the Helsinki Metro construction site will be part of the course in addition to two team exercises that will apply the concepts and approaches in real world transport planning situations.

It will be a unique experience in which both the real world issues and the analytical approaches will be presented by internationally renowned experts.

The instructors will include Dr Shinya Kikuchi, professor, Virginia Tech, US, and Dr Antti Talvitie, professor emeritus, Chief Researcher, Aalto University School of Engineering, Finland.

Dr Tapio Luttinen, professor in Transportation Engineering and head of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, will be Al Sharhan’s guide at Aalto University, while Dr Sgouris Sgouridis, associate professor, will be his adviser at Masdar Institute.

Al Sharhan is currently working on “Public Transportation for Abu Dhabi: Potential for a Sustainable Public Transportation System” under the supervision of Dr Sgouridis.

Dr Sgouridis said: “The Helsinki Summer School in Transportation has established itself as a premier programme offering innovative and practical approaches to tackle complex transport challenges.

“The school offers an intensive learning experience to transport professionals and graduate students of varying backgrounds and we believe it will prove beneficial to Al Sharhan, whose research is closely related to the course’s main theme. The course will further enrich Al Sharhan’s learning experience and will positively impact his research outcome,” he added.

Other participants at the Summer School include representatives from Technical University of Denmark, World Bank, Finland’s Destia Corp., University of Oxford in the UK, Virginia Tech, US, and University of California, Davis, US.

Al Sharhan said: “The enrolment in this summer school in Finland will add considerable value to my research and provide me with an opportunity to get in-depth insights in this field. I believe attending this summer school will widen my knowledge and help me to better represent my research, especially now when I am progressing midway.

“Moreover, the participation will help me to highlight the advantages of Masdar Institute and initiate relations with students and experts from other top universities and institutions around the world. As a member of the YFEL programme I am keen to bring back the rich insights I gain at the course and put them into my research project on my return to Masdar Institute.”