The Minister of Science and Technology, Minister Naledi Pandor, will be opening the Nanotechnology Innovation Centre at Rhodes University. The centre, under the Directorship of Professor Tebello Nyokong, has state-of-the-art facilities that will place the Chemistry Department at Rhodes as one of the best in the country and beyond.

The National Research Foundation (NRF) invited the minister to visit Professor Nyokong as a recipient South African Research Chair funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) through the NRF. Minister Pandor will experience the success of training high level manpower firsthand.

The students will be able to talk to the minister about their research (in non-scientific terms) and their experiences as students within the Chair’s group.

Many of the Chair’s students spend time in overseas laboratories (including Japan, UK, Germany, Switzerland, France, Belgium), through Bilateral agreements signed between South Africa and these countries. The Minister will be able to see the success of these Bilateral agreements.

The graduate students within the Chair’s group come from many countries. At the moment full time PhD/MSc, exchange, and post-doctoral students are from South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Germany, Turkey and Belgium.

The minister will also officially open the DST/Mintek Nanotechnology Innovation Centre – Sensors which is located at Rhodes University (Chemistry and Pharmaceutical sciences building). The aim of the Centre is to design sensors for early disease detection and health monitoring. Professor Tebello Nyokong is also the director of this Centre.

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