Hesham Sallam is an Egyptian vertebrate paleontologist and founder of the Mansoura University Vertebrate Paleontology Center (MUVP), the first program of its kind in Egypt and the wider Middle East. Before MUVP, Egyptian universities had no dedicated vertebrate paleontology research groups, despite Egypt's history of major fossil finds by foreign expeditions dating back to Ernst Stromer.[1]
In 2018, Sallam and his team announced Mansourasaurus shahinae, a titanosaurian sauropod discovered in the Dakhla Oasis -- the first largely complete dinosaur skeleton found in Egypt since the early 1900s, and a rare window into African dinosaur life near the end of the Cretaceous. The find drew international attention as evidence that Egypt could sustain a homegrown paleontology program rather than depending entirely on foreign-led digs.[1]
Sallam has continued to build MUVP into a training ground for Egyptian and regional students, positioning Mansoura University as a hub for African vertebrate paleontology.[1]