Iman Salehi Hikouei, Ph.D.
Country specialists collect and analyze information on production, trade, and consumption of minerals throughout the world.
Iman Salehi Hikouei is a physical scientist at the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Minerals Information Center. He collects, analyzes, and authors reports on the mineral industries of the Middle East, providing insights that support U.S. government decision-making on critical minerals and global supply chains.
He covers Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. These countries are important producers of aluminum, cement, copper, gypsum, iron ore, steel, and phosphates, and their location at the crossroads of Asia, Europe, and Africa makes them central to global mineral trade and investment. Iman also contributes to the Minerals Yearbook, where he develops country chapters based on data collection, trade statistics, and policy review.
Before joining USGS, he completed a postdoctoral fellowship on a NASA-funded project at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. His research applied groundwater modeling, remote sensing, and machine learning to study carbon loss, hydrology, and wildfire risk in Indonesian tropical peatlands. He earned his Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Georgia, where his work focused on coastal soil characterization, restoration, and the application of remote sensing and data science for environmental systems.