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Growing Materials Science in Africa – The Case of the African School for Electronic Structure Methods and Applications (ASESMA)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 February 2018

George Amolo ,
Nithaya Chetty ,
Ali Hassanali ,
Daniel Joubert ,
Richard Martin  and
Sandro Scandolo
George Amolo
Affiliation:
Department of Physics and Space Sciences, Technical University of Kenya, PO Box52428 00200NairobiKenya
Nithaya Chetty*
Affiliation:
Physics Department, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, 0001, South Africa and National Institute for Theoretical Physics, Johannesburg, 2000, South Africa
Ali Hassanali
Affiliation:
International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy
Daniel Joubert
Affiliation:
School of Physics, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2000, South Africa
Richard Martin
Affiliation:
Stanford University, Palo Alto, California, USA and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, USA
Sandro Scandolo
Affiliation:
International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy
*
*(Email: [email protected])
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Abstract

Materials science is arguably the most important discipline in the physical sciences that should be developed in Africa given its rich resources of minerals, energy and biological diversity. Developing materials science should therefore be an important goal for Africa with important opportunities for economic benefits and quality people development. There are already many successful materials science activities that are underway in Africa. This needs to gain wider international attention and should become contact points for international collaborations. The African School for Electronic Structure Methods and Applications (ASESMA)[1,2,3,4] is one such successful initiative that has been in existence for the past decade. ASESMA has shown that it is possible to build a network across sub-Saharan Africa with world-class research with a relatively low budget. The greatest asset is the commitment of the lecturers and mentors, the team-work of the local organisers and the idealism of the participants who rank amongst the brightest of young minds from Africa, many of whom come from impoverished backgrounds but still dare to reach for the stars.

Keywords

educationsimulationquantum materials
Type
Articles
Information
MRS Advances , Volume 3 , Issue 37: African Materials Research Society 2017 , 2018 , pp. 2183 - 2201
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2018 

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References

Material progress in Africa, Chetty, Nithaya, Martin, Richard M. and Scandolo, Sandro, Nature Physics 6, 1 (2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raising the scientific level and networking in Africa, Feder, T., Physics Today 64, 28 (2011)Google Scholar
Mentoring a Generation of Materials Scientists in Africa, Amolo, George and Martin, Richard M., Newsletter of the Forum for International Physics of the APS (Spring 2015), http://www.aps.org/units/fip/newsletters/201502/index.cfmGoogle Scholar
Theoretical Physics is Much More than Equations: Origins of the African School for Electronic Structure Methods and Applications, by Martin, Richard M., APS News, December 2016, http://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/201612/international.cfmGoogle Scholar
https://www.nature.com/articles/nmat3262Google Scholar
See https://avs.org/AVS/files/0c/0c8057f6–71cd-4c13-ad6f-8c9907f85eb9.pdfGoogle Scholar
Michael Levitt did his undergraduate chemistry degree at the University of Pretoria.Google Scholar