ASSAF recognises top SA scientists

South Africa: The Good News    Translate This Article
19 October 2012

The Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf) recognised top South African scientists at its prestigious Annual Awards Ceremony held in Pretoria on Wednesday. ASSAf annually awards up to two ASSAf Science-for-Society Gold Medals for outstanding achievement in scientific thinking for the benefit of society. This year two awardees were selected.

Jill Adler is the First Rand Foundation-National Research Foundation Chair of Mathematics Education at the University of the Witwatersrand, as well as the Chair of Mathematics Education at Kings College, London.

She is recognised as one of the world's leading experts in mathematics education research. Her book Teaching Mathematics in Multilingual Classrooms was instrumental in leading research internationally in the field. Her more recent work on mathematics teacher education has been published in French and Portuguese. Her work is that of the 'engaged scholar', doing rigorous and theoretically rich research at the cutting edge of international work in the field which at the same time contributes to critical areas of local and regional need in education. Included in the latter is her enormous contribution to research capacity development - her work with research teams and graduate students has made a substantial contribution, particularly in southern Africa.

Adler has provided South Africans and Africans in mathematics education with an exemplary role model in leadership and research excellence. Her message has always been that we do not only have a role to play in participating in the international arena of mathematics education, but also have a role to play in leading research internationally.

Kobus Eloff has made significant contributions in several areas that are important to society. These include areas such as soil fertility, toxic plant and cyanobacteria metabolism and ecology, as well as the use of compounds from plants as medicines and biopesticides.

He was appointed as the Executive Director of the eight National Botanical Gardens with the Head Office at Kirstenbosch. He changed the research culture of the organisation and established a new focus area of indigenous plant utilisation. He succeeded in combining the National Botanical Gardens, a statutory body, with the state department Botanical Research Institute to form the National Botanical Institute (NBI) and was appointed Director of Research of the NBI. After retiring he was appointed at the University of Pretoria where he started working on using compounds in plants to increase the quality of life of people in South Africa in the Phytomedicine Programme.

A major contribution to society was the training of previously disadvantaged students. Coming from a very large and relatively poor family and being the first family member ever to attend a university, he has empathy with struggling, especially black, students. His life motto: 'Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est' (Where there is caring and love, God is present) plays an important role in his work with students.

Two young scientists were also recognised at the Annual Awards ceremony and presented with prestigious AU-TWAS prizes. The AU-TWAS award scheme aims to recognise and award talented young scientists in Africa.

The prize in life and earth sciences was awarded to Prof Alta Schutte from the North-West University and Prof Thokozani Majozi from the University of Pretoria received the prize for basic science, technology and innovation.

The AU-TWAS Prize for Young Scientists in South Africa is managed by the Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf), on behalf of its partners, the African Union Commission (AUC), the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World (TWAS) and the Department of Science and Technology (DST). Through this award, the AU and TWAS jointly recognise and award an outstanding scientist in South Africa. The recipient should be under the age of forty, living and working in South Africa, and have a record of research publications in internationally recognised science journals. The award pertains to the science fields of Life and Earth Sciences; and Basic Science, Technology and Innovation.

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