About Layla Al Zoubi
Layla Al Zoubi is an Environmental Research & Policy Fellow at ICELIS Global, where she supports regional projects focused on water resilience, climate vulnerability, and satellite-based monitoring across the Arabian Gulf. Currently pursuing a B.A. in Astronomy and Planetary Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder), Layla brings a cross-disciplinary lens to environmental sustainability, grounded in planetary science, climate communication, and geospatial analysis.
At ICELIS, Layla has contributed to research on groundwater stress, coastal exposure to sea level rise, and the legal dimensions of desalination and soil salinity in Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Her work incorporates tools such as Python, GIS, ArcGIS, and QGIS, to visualize risk and inform environmental policy.
She has also supported ICELIS’s ESG benchmarking and SDG alignment efforts, Her work supports multiple Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including SDG 13 (Climate Action), SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), SDG 14 (Life Below Water), SDG 15 (Life on Land), SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), and SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production), through contributions to climate resilience, water security, marine biodiversity conservation, ecosystem restoration, urban risk mapping, and sustainability outreach.
Layla’s field experience includes marine biodiversity research with the Maldives Whale Shark Research Programme (MWSRP), where she contributed to whale shark monitoring. She is a NASA–QEERI Young Innovator Award recipient and has led student campaigns on marine conservation, biodiversity, and youth climate advocacy. She is currently working under the mentorship of Shivani Patel, Senior Marine Scientific Officer at the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (Qatar), a member of the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA), and an experienced marine scientist and PADI Advanced Diver, working on cetaceans, dugongs, seagrass and coral ecosystems, sharks, rays, and whale sharks across the Arabian Gulf.
Fluent in English and French, and conversational in Arabic, Spanish and Korean, Layla is passionate about bridging satellite science and environmental law to support data-driven resilience in the Global South.
Layla Al Zoubi
Associate
ICELIS Global