We dedicated the 5^th of July to our wonderful team members from Algeria as they were celebrating their home country’s Independence Day!

As always, we took this opportunity to discover new things about our colleagues, as well as learn some fun facts about beautiful Algeria.

Did you know that?

• Algeria Independence Day marks the date July 5^th, 1962,when Algeria was finally free of a long and bitter occupation from the French colonization that lasted 130 years.
• Algeria is only 60 years old, which is considered very young for a country!
• Algerians usually celebrate by playing national songs, hanging the Algerian flag everywhere or watching historical movies in the cinema theaters all over the country.
• The white in the Algerian flag represents peace; the green, star, and crescent represent Islam; and the red symbolizes the blood of those killed fighting for independence in the Algerian War.
• Algeria’s Sahara is the biggest sand desert in the world and historically, it was all green lands with a variety of fauna living in it.
• Prehistorical cave paintings that indicated the fauna diversity from 7,000 years ago were found on the territory of Algeria according to UNESCO.
• 5^th of July is also a reminder of the 1.5 million martyrs that gave their lives over the 7 years of revolution (1954-1962) so other Algerians can live their lives in freedom.
• There are multiple ruins and architectural buildings scattered all over the country, reflecting all the history Algeria went through from Roman ruins, Turkish and French architecture etc.

There are many Algerian scientists in multiple fields of work who contributed to mankind:

• Belgacem Haba is counted among the 100 most productive inventors in 2012, holding over 500 U.S. patents, and over 1,400 patents and patent applications worldwide.
• Yasmine Belkaid is best known for her work studying host-microbe interactions in tissues and immune regulation to microbes.
• Kamal Youcef-Toumi created the world’s fastest ultra-precise laser-cutting robot.
• Haraoubia Brahim is mostly know in the field of telecommunications and electronics where he published multiple books. He also has 5 inventions, one of which is an important component of flash disks.
• Noureddine Melikechi is an atomic, molecular, and optical physicist, educator and inventor, member of the Mars Science Laboratory, NASA’s largest Mars exploration effort to date.

“I’m proud to be Algerian because of the bravery of our martyrs, the revolution, rich history, Islam Religion and Algerian Culture.” – Hamza Merakchi (Nobel Country Ambassador from Algeria)