In 1994, telecommunications was on the verge of exploding, with mobile phones, personal computers and the internet just starting to emerge. That’s why Mazen Omar Hasna – then an electrical engineering student at Qatar University – decided to make telecom research his life’s work. Today, that work has put him on the list of the World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds.
He credits his success to identifying research trends and solutions to problems facing his community.
“Becoming a Highly Cited Researcher is a byproduct, and not a target by itself,” he says. “What matters is to work on problems that have an impact on society and try to contribute to their solutions.”
Affordable rural communication
Hasna has worked extensively to bring affordable internet and cell phone options to people living deep in the desert or in mountain villages. To do this, he’s helped create systems of cooperative and relayed communications which enhance network coverage at a low cost. They’re easy to deploy, low-maintenance and inexpensive.
“Everyone uses mobile phones, and sometimes users suffer from poor network coverage,” he says. “I was among the first researchers to work on solutions to these problems, with the aim to enhance network coverage and improve the quality of phone calls. This idea has gone far since my work in the early 2000s and found its way to telecommunication standards.”
One example of his work is the Comoros Islands Project on low cost wifi networks. This project developed a scalable technology to bring internet connection to the African nation’s three major islands. The same technology can be used to bring internet connections to many underdeveloped and rural areas. Google and Facebook are working to address similar problems, but Hasna’s team helped in creating (together with a team from Polytechnic De Torino) a simpler, cheaper and lower maintenance solution which local people could maintain and expand.
Hasna says digital communication will soon incorporate the Internet of Things, enabling devices, vehicles, buildings and other items to exchange data.
