Zayed National Museum's Magan Boat and Research Hub

The Zayed National Museum in Abu Dhabi has established itself as a major research hub, highlighted by the Magan Boat project—a 18-meter-long reconstruction of a Bronze Age vessel completed in 2024. The boat, based on ancient clay tablet descriptions, was built by over 20 specialists and sailed 50 nautical miles in the Arabian Gulf, reaching 5.6 knots. The museum features six permanent galleries, including 'By Our Coasts' with an interactive scent wall, and 'To Our Ancestors' displaying the 8,000-year-old Marawah Woman burial. Research facilities include conservation labs, a digitalization studio, and multispectral imaging, which revealed unseen verses in the Blue Qur'an. The Zayed National Museum Research Fund, launched in 2023, awards AED 1 million annually to projects across disciplines and countries, with recipients studying ancient DNA, pottery shards, and women's history. The museum aims to deepen international collaborations and expand its oral history collection.