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08 May 2024
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The Dean of the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, Prof Paul Oberholster, has the pleasure of inviting you to the inaugural lecture of Prof Dirk Opperman.
Date: 21 May 2024
Time: 17:30
Venue: Equitas
Click here to RSVP before Wednesday, 15 May 2024. Alternatively, contact Christelle van Rooyen on +27 51 401 9190.
About Prof Dirk Opperman
Prof Dirk Opperman obtained his PhD in Biochemistry at the University of the Free State in 2008. This was followed by postdoctoral research on directed evolution with Prof Manfred T Reetz at the Max Planck Institute for Coal Research (Germany). In 2010, he was appointed in the Department of Microbiology and Biochemistry. He subsequently established structural biology at the UFS, and his current research focus lies at the interface of evolutionary and structure-function relationships of biocatalysts, and their application in green chemistry. He is an NRF B-rated researcher with co-authored papers in Science, Nature Communications, and Angewandte Chemie.
His research has been funded by both local and international organisations, ranging from industries such as SASOL to the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF, UK). He has a long-standing collaboration with researchers at the Delft University of Technology (TUDelft, the Netherlands) and is currently part of a European Research Area Network Cofund (ERA-NET Cofund) partnership on Food Systems and Climate (FOSC) that develops biocatalysts for upcycling waste.
Kotaro Fukuma - awe inspiring
2008-03-10
On Thursday, 28 February 2008, the Japanese pianist, Kotaro Fukuma, gave a piano recital in the Odeion.
Kotaro provided the audience with a rendition that showed complete technical and interpretative mastery, which Elretha Britz described as a “flawless performance” in the Volksblad.
The performance began with Haydn’s Piano Sonata, Op. 9. It was followed by Schumann’s “Carnival” and three compositions by Kotaro’s fellow countryman, Toru Takemitsu, who passed away in 1996. After a tour though an imaginative landscape of sound in Takemitsu’s compositions, he rounded off his programme with Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No. 3.
The audience not having had enough, were then treated to a Liszt transcription of Schumann’s Lied, Widmung, as an encore.
The concert was well supported by the people of Bloemfontein who went home more than satisfied. In fact, there were standing ovations at the end of almost every work.