H3Africa Spotlights

Lebogang Montewa is a Coordinator for IFGeneRA project under the umbrella of GeneMAP. Her previous role at the South African Medical Research Council has involved capacity development and training for researchers in South Africa where she developed a strong interest for science communication. She has worked in the NGO sector in the East, West and central Africa to advance collaboration of communities and the health facilities for best practices in Paediatric HIV management and service uptake. This advanced her passion for community engagement.
She is also pursuing her PhD to create an evidence base about engagement practices for ethical dialogues in genomics research and her project aims to explore effective ways of fostering ethical dialogues in genomics research using theory-driven and creative approaches to evaluate effective engagement practices to engage research participants. Her passion for Science communication has advanced her interest to explore film making to shine a light on the amazing research work done in Africa. Her proposal to the UCT film school was among the top 5 selected to be produced into a mini documentary for GeneMAP in 2018. She is the content producer for h3Africa promotional video documentary released earlier this year. Outside this scope Lebogang is passionate about Gardening and exploring new places.

Nadja is currently the Study Coordinator for Deciphering Developmental Disorders in Africa (DDD-Africa) – Evaluating Clinical Exome Sequencing in an African Setting. The DDD-Africa project is based in Johannesburg, South Africa with a secondary recruitment site in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. The project focuses on identifying possible genetic factors that cause developmental disorders in Africans.

She is based at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg although having completed her MSc Human Genetics at the University of Pretoria. Her MSc was focused on Paraganglioma in the Afrikaner population and was titled “The First SDHB Founder Mutation Identified In South African Paraganglioma Families”. Previous research experience includes breast – and ovarian cancer, especially in the Afrikaner population. Preceding her role as study coordinator, she was employed as the research assistant for the DDD-Africa project.

Congratulations to Ruth Nanjala on being the first prize winner of the Fellows Speed Presentations at the 19th H3Africa Consortium Meeting that took place from 29 May to 1 June in Abuja, Nigeria.

Ruth Nanjala is an Eastern Africa Network for Bioinformatics Training (EANBiT) fellow. She presently leads the Bioinformatics mentorship and incubation program at the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE), Kenya. She pursued an M.Sc. in Bioinformatics at Pwani University, Kenya and the University of Cape Town, South Africa. Her Masters’ research focused on evaluating the accuracy of genotype imputation in the Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) region in selected African populations. She holds a B.Sc. degree in Microbiology from Pwani University where she graduated with a first-class honors degree. Ruth is interested in human genetics and genomics research, with particular focus on applying bioinformatics to understand the mechanisms underlying human diseases, especially diseases such as cancer which claims many lives in Africa. She hopes to work towards addressing the gap in disease diagnoses, prognosis and treatment and thus improve the health and lives of others.

Study Coordinator Working Group Chairperson Dr. Nasinghe Emmanuel is a medical officer working with CAFGEN as a study coordinator. He worked as a clinician in HIV/TB endemic areas for 2 years before joining Prof. Joloba's laboratory as Research Assistant. His duties as a study coordinator include; 1. Maintaining the Study Master File. 2. Ensuring that all study protocols are approved on time, and maintaining active IRB status throughout the study period. 3. Coordinating the patient recruiting clinic with the laboratory and Biorepository. 4. Ensuring that all study samples are processed on time and stored at the required temperatures. 5. Ensuring quality assurance and quality control of all Laboratory processes. 6. Preparing and submitting study progress reports.

Oge is the Study Coordinator of African Breast Cancer Epidemiology; AFBRECANE (PI: Prof. Clement Adedbamowo). The project aims at studying the incidence of breast cancer, the role of different risk factors, incidence and prevalence of molecular subtypes, the role of oncogenic viruses, and the contributions of indigenous African diets to breast cancer care. AFBRECANE is a case-cohort study with enrollments ongoing at 5 sites.
Oge obtained her BNSc (Hons) in Nursing from the University of Nigeria Nsukka and currently rounding off her Masters in Public Health. Her previous reseach experiences includes cervical cancer, HIV/AIDS and lifestyle modifications in Africa populaton. Oge is a passion-driven, dynamic, dedicated, resilient, proactive and intuitive public health practitioner. Her hobbies include: reading, brainstorming, cooking and travelling. You can reach her and interact further via e-mail; gechi012@gmail.com.