Venâncio Taimo is a native of Maputo, the capital of Mozambique. He is eager, like many bright young students of that country, to repair the deep damage done by decades of colonial and then civil war – in his case, to provide safe access to clean drinking water.

Benjamin Kumwenda from Malawi began his scientific career studying undergraduate biology at the University of Malawi – Chancellor College in Zomba. But as he made his way through the course requirements for his Bachelor of Science degree, he felt equally drawn to Computer Science, and took as many interesting CS courses as he could fit into his schedule.

Godwil Madamombe, a native of Zimbabwe, earned his bachelor’s degree in crop science and his master’s degree in crop protection at the University of Zimbabwe, based in Harare. During his first major crop protection project, he worked for the government as a plant pathologist.

Raising and exporting black tea is an activity of major importance in Africa today; Africa  has become the world’s second largest tea exporting region after India. Tea has been grown in China for perhaps a millennium “by hand,” with farmers seeking out and hand-selecting the tea bushes producing the best yield and quality of tea.

SABINA graduate Justin Omolo was the first RISE student to earn his PhD, which he completed in December 2011. In doing so he has traveled an original and creative path, exploring surprising links between the knowledge of traditional healers and the techniques of modern bioinformatics and synthetic chemistry.

Celsus Sente is just beginning his work as a RISE student, but he brings to it a wealth of diverse experiences in several fields and a fervent curiosity about nature.

Paul Kojo Mensah, a SSAWRN student at Rhodes University in South Africa, has tackled and completed a project of great value and considerable complexity: testing the effects of herbicide use on aquatic organisms in the Eastern Cape region, and developing guidelines for herbicide use based on the responses of those organisms.

Odume Oghenekaro Nelson is a Nigerian student who entered the RISE program at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa, in 2009. Since then he has become adept in the use of a new approach in testing water quality based on the presence or condition of certain aquatic insects.

This is an update of an earlier profile here.

Raphael Tshimanga is the first RISE student in the SSAWRN network to have completed his PhD, and he is impatient to put it to good use. He will do so by returning to his home institution, the University of Kinshasa, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where he has been appointed Deputy Head of the Department of Natural Resources Management.