King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, popularly referred to as KAUST, welcomes a founding faculty of more than 60 accomplished scientists and engineers and a diverse inaugural class of 350 graduate students to the shores of the Red Sea, in Thuwal, Saudi Arabia. The university, located 80 KM north of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia’s second largest city, is a new independent, merit-based university, the dream of King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia. KAUST groundbreaking ceremonies for construction took place in October 2007 officially and the masterplan for a 36-million square meter campus and community has come to fruition in 2009. Opening in September the internationally diverse faculty and students will arrive onto a campus lined by 11,000 palm trees and an architecturally stunning campus, harbor town center, and state of the art core labs and master facilities. As a new “House of Wisdom”, KAUST is an inspired community of researchers with a passion for advancing the frontiers of science and addressing global challenges KAUST.