NASA has named an asteroid after a 19-year-old from Saudi Arabia, in recognition of her scientific research in the field of botany.
The asteroid has been named Al-Sheikh 33535 after Fatima bint Abdel Moneim Al Sheikh, whose research "Determining The Effect of the Novel Carl 2 Strigolactone Analog on the Seed Germination of Parasitic Weeds" saw her placed as second runner-up in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair in 2016, the Saudi Press Agency reports.
"We desperately need the brainpower of all smart people to solve some of humanity's most difficult problems, and we can't afford to reject half the population's."
Her work targets the roots and seeds of parasitic weeds which cause serious damage to agricultural crops.
Al-Sheikh received $1,500 from ISEF, the world's largest international high school science competition, which attracts entries from around 1,800 students from around the world.
She was invited to enter ISEF after winning the National Olympiad for Scientific Creativity, hosted by King Abdulaziz and his Companions Foundation for Giftedness & Creativity, along with the Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia.
She told a local newspaper she was pleased by the news that NASA had named an asteroid after her.
Al-Sheikh is in good company. In 2015 NASA named an asteroid after Pakistani activist and Nobel Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai after the NASA astronomer who discovered the it realised very few asteroids honoured the contributions of women or ethnic minorities.
"We desperately need the brainpower of all smart people to solve some of humanity's most difficult problems, and we can't afford to reject half the population's," Dr Amy Mainzer wrote at the time.
Al-Sheikh plans to continue her studies at Brown University in the United States.
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