Survival engineering, built from scrap.

Food, water, power and sanitation that communities in crisis can build themselves.

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The Nushoor portable power station: a wooden case of salvaged batteries and wiring on a workbench — A portable power station, built from parts salvaged from destroyed vehicles and junkyards.

“What if our response was not reactive, but proactive?”

The question Dr. Saquib Ahmed and Dr. Tariq Ahmed started Nushoor withGive monthly

Dr. Saquib Ahmed and Dr. Tariq Ahmed standing at a whiteboard of project notes — Dr. Saquib Ahmed and Dr. Tariq Ahmed, the founders, planning at the whiteboard.

Nushoor means “to bring back to life.”

Or resurrection: building solutions now, instead of waiting for the next tragedy.

Mission: Food, water, fuel, power and sanitation that can be built where they are needed.
Vision: No community dependent on fragile, top-down aid.
Technology arm: Designs and hands over simple, life-sustaining technology made from local materials.
Education arm: STEAM teaching for local problem-solvers, and a media team making instructional videos.
Method: Listen to partners, build with them, hand it over, keep improving it.

Watch our video

Six needs, one build at a time.

For the Rohingya camps and Yemen, Sudan, Congo and Gaza, and disaster sites in the US. Choose a need to see what is being built for it.

Water

Locally constructible systems for clean, safe drinking water in crisis zones.

In development

Purifying water
Proofs of concept from local materials for water purification and desalination.

The team

Water Purification
Purifying water of contaminants, and desalinating it.

Handed over in Gaza

Solar stills for water purification

What your gift builds.

Six LaunchGood campaigns, each paying for one build.

Resilient greenhouses

Modular greenhouses that restore food production, regenerate soil and send agricultural kits home with families.

Back it on LaunchGood

Portable power stations

Modular, repairable stations that store and share energy from wind, pedal and solar.

Back it on LaunchGood

Join Team 25.

$25a month

It pays for prototyping materials, travel to learn each project’s skills, and the small costs between.

Quarterly updates by newsletter
A personal tour of our center
A look at our future plans, on request

Nushoor Institute is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, Tax ID 41‑2350330, and your donation is tax deductible. If a project is finished, overfunded or blocked, your gift goes where it is needed most. Donation policy

Researchers in Buffalo, engineers in the camps.

STEAM educators and prototype designers in Buffalo; field engineers, community liaisons and local innovators in the Rohingya camps. These are the officers who steer them.

Join a team