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In 1999 Hawass led an excavation and preservation project at Egypt's Bahariya Oasis that discovered more than 200 Greco-Roman mummies, many of them lavishly gilded. This ancient cemetery, now called the Valley of the Golden Mummies, may hold hundreds more mummies and is considered one of the most important finds in Egypt since the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb. In addition, Hawass directed the conservation of the Sphinx at Giza. In September 2002, Hawass spearheaded exploration of a shaft in the Great Pyramid of Giza using a robot.

"I believe that we've only found about 30 percent of Egyptian monuments, that 70 percent of them still lie buried underneath the ground," Hawass says. "You never know what the sand will hide in the way of secrets."

Born in Dumyt (Damietta), Egypt, on May 28, 1947, Hawass studied archaeology in both Egypt and the United States and received a Fulbright scholarship in 1980. In 1987 he earned his Ph.D. in Egyptology from the University of Pennsylvania. Since 1988 he has taught Egyptian archaeology, history, and culture, most recently at Cairo University, the American University in Cairo, and the University of California at Los Angeles.

Hawass has been a consultant for documentaries, films, television specials, and magazine stories and has written extensively on Middle Eastern and Egyptian archaeology.

In 2000 Hawass received the Distinguished Scholar award from the Association of Egyptian American Scholars and was one of 30 international figures to receive the Golden Plate Award from the American Academy of Achievement.