The US should offer "matching funds" to oil-rich Arab states prepared to increase investment in building capacity in science and technology, a leading American Arab scientist has said.

Mostafa El-Sayed, a professor of chemistry and director of the Laser Dynamics Centre of the Georgia Institute of Technology, suggested such a move could form part of US efforts to regain public trust in the Middle East.

The proposal was made by El-Sayed while speaking at the annual meeting last week of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), science portal SciDev.net reported.

He said advances in science and technology had the potential to act as stabilising factors in Arab economies.

An Egyptian by birth, El-Sayed trained at the University of Cairo but has worked in the US since 1954.

Encouraging wealthier Arab nations to invest in research and development, particularly in poorer countries in the region, El-Sayed said contributing US funds "would be an inexpensive way to make our good intentions known to our Arab friends, recover our influence in the region and regain their trust".

Addressing a session of the AAAS meeting devoted to "Science in the Arab World", he urged the National Science Foundation, which currently provides about $1 million a year to support research in the Arab world, to significantly increase this figure.

In particular, El-Sayed said, additional money should be allocated to countries like Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon, which have a large number of scientists but are lacking in equipment and facilities.

"There is a lot of misunderstanding between the US and Arab countries, based on differences in religion and ideology but science is a language that we all speak," El-Sayed told the meeting.

"The advances it brings can help fuel the economies of countries that don't have the tremendous oil wealth of some of the other Arab countries."

El-Sayed admitted that extra investment in science from the US would be unlikely to single-handedly reduce anti-American sentiment on the streets of Arab cities.

But he suggested that working partnerships formed in this way could help promote an atmosphere of trust and understanding throughout academia, which could have a trickle-down impact on other parts of society.

"The level of communication that is necessary for successful research partnerships is a step towards getting people in Egypt and other Arab countries to see Americans as partners," El-Sayed said.