The University of the Free State (UFS) boasts a total of 12 nominations for the prestigious 2023/2024 NSTF-South32 Awards, popularly known as the “Science Oscars” of South Africa – the most the university has ever received. Nine UFS researchers have been nominated in seven of the 15 categories.

The NSTF Awards honour and celebrate outstanding contributions to science, engineering, and technology (SET) and innovation and have become the most prestigious public SET and innovation awards in South Africa. The finalists will be announced later in May and the winners on 11 July at gala event.

Leading the nominations

Profs Anthony Turton, water expert from the UFS Centre for Environmental Management (CEM) and Director of the Environmental Engineering Programme (Pty) Ltd, and Stephen Brown, Principal Specialist and Head of the Division of Paediatric Cardiology in the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health, lead the pack with three and two nominations respectively.

Prof Turton, who was also nominated in 2008, has been nominated in the categories Green Economy Award, NSTF-Water Research Commission (WRC) Award and the Innovation Award: Small, Medium and Micro Enterprise (SMME) category. Prof Brown has been nominated in the TW Kambule-NSTF Award: Researcher and the NSTF-SAMRC Clinician-Scientist Award categories.

“I am deeply humbled especially after I viewed the quality of the other nominees. I would like to thank the UFS for putting my name forward. The two categories are a total surprise; I do not have words, especially in this latter phase of my career. It is so rare nowadays that one’s hard work over the years is recognised by one’s peers,” says Prof Brown, who was the recipient of the UFS Council Medal for outstanding service in 2023.

Prof Brown is currently involved as study leader in five PhD projects and three master’s student projects and is especially excited about one project that is looking at pulmonary hypertension (hypertension of the lung blood vessels) in South African children. Another project is looking at adult transcatheter valve outcomes.

“I am also busy with a chapter in a book and a conceptual article regarding the physiology of single ventricle heart conditions in children. As clinical director of the Robert WM Frater Research, in co-ordination with Prof Francis Smit, we are in the early (embryonic) planning phase of a collaborative echocardiography project, including machine learning and rural screening,” says Prof Brown.

Prof Turton says it is a good feeling being nominated as it is recognition for primary research that has the potential to be commercialised with a positive impact on the deteriorating water quality situation in South Africa.

“The technology is scalable and has an interesting franchise option that captures the knowledge and reduces the risk of failure during replication efforts. The nomination means that my work is being taken note of. This is of great importance in the context of our failing wastewater works where water quality is becoming a national concern,” he explains.

Researching bats

Prof Peter Taylor from the UFS Department of Zoology and Entomology, Afromontane Research Unit (ARU), has been nominated in the Lifetime Award category and says it is an honour to be considered by the UFS to be a worthy nominee – especially given the calibre of other nominees. He also is a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa.

Prof Taylor’s work focuses on communities of bats and other small mammals in natural and agricultural landscapes in predominantly Afromontane regions of Southern Africa.

“I have been researching bats since about 1994, when I realised how little was known about them in South Africa, the threats to their conservation, and in particular the ecosystem services they provide to humans. I have written four books and numerous scientific papers on bats, and it was always my goal to be able to estimate and demonstrate their economic value to farmers in terms of their predation on insect crop pests.

“Through my research on bats in macadamia orchards starting 12 years ago, this goal came to fruition as I was able to work with colleagues from Germany and South Africa to conduct predator exclosure experiments in macadamia orchards (putting nets over the trees to keep out insect-eating bats and birds) – proving that bats provide huge value in biological control.”

Prof Taylor is still carrying out research into bats as ecosystem service providers through his students and ecological indictors of environmental health in the apple and livestock industries in the eastern Free State.

Cause for celebration

The UFS also has four nominations in the category TW Kambule-NSTF Award: Emerging Researcher in Drs Angèlique Lewies, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery; Mpho S Mafa, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Plant Sciences; Matlakala C Ntsapi, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Basic Medical Sciences; and Yolandi Schoeman, Researcher in the Centre for Mineral Biogeochemistry and Environmental Management.

Prof Sandy-Lynn Steenhuisen, Associate Professor and Subject Head: Department of Plant Sciences and the ARU, was nominated in the category Green Economy Award, while Dr Bimo Abraham Nkhata, Senior Lecturer at the CEM, has been nominated alongside Prof Turton for the NSTF-Water Research Commission (WRC) Award.

Prof Vasu Reddy, Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Research and Internationalisation at the UFS who has nominated the researchers along the Directorate Research Development’s (DRD) and their respective departments, says: “This rich UFS line-up of formidable scientists is cause for celebration. These sought-after awards recognise excellence and align so well with the UFS’ Vision 130. We are delighted to see a range of our scholars being considered for some signal awards. This is testimony to the impactful work each of our colleagues is making in their respective fields.”