A fellowship programme, funded by the Japanese government and organised by ICTP, will enable African students to study abroad yet remain affiliated with institutions in their home countries.

Lifting Science and Math
in Africa

As endless reports have shown, a large number of native-born Africans with advanced degrees in mathematics and science have abandoned their homeland to pursue their careers elsewhere. Equally disturbing, only a small percentage of students in Africa over the past several decades have sought advanced degrees in mathematics and science in the first place.
"No one doubts that there's a crisis," says K.R. Sreenivasan, ICTP director. "In fact, analysts have been lamenting the chronic shortfalls of well-trained professors and talented students in science and mathematics in Africa for some time. I just completed an informal survey of African scientists and everyone I spoke to put this problem at the top of the list of their concerns."
"The critical question," adds Sreenivasan, "is not what's happening---that's painfully obvious---but what to do about it. That's why we are so pleased to have received generous funding from Japan's Fund in Trust (JFIT) to launch the Mori Fellowship programme for young scientists and mathematicians from sub-Saharan Africa." The initiative is named after Yoshiro Mori, a former prime minister of Japan who has been a tireless proponent of international cooperation and assistance.
Specifically, the Mori Fellowship programme will provide 10 fellowships each year over a three-year period to qualified students in a broad range of fields in mathematics and physics. Its ultimate goal is to strengthen the human capacity of sub-Saharan Africa by offering high-level educational and research opportunities to students pursuing advanced doctorate and post-doctorate degrees in areas such as condensed matter physics, the physics of weather and climate, fluid dynamics, oceanography and seismology, as well as in pure and applied mathematics.
"The Mori Fellowship programme," says Noureini Tidjani-Serpos, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Africa, "adds a strong science education component to JFIT's other human capacity initiatives which include, for instance, audiovisual media training in Kenya, information and communication technology capacity building for journalists in Ghana, and a feasibility study for the creation of a virtual library in Nigeria." Approximately US$440,000 has been allocated for the three-year programme which, if proven successful, may be renewed.
"During the 1970s," says Gallieno Denardo, special advisor to the ICTP director and the past head of the Centre's Office of External Activities (OEA), "sub-Saharan Africa had some of the finest institutions of higher education in the developing world, including Dar-Es-Salaam in Tanzania, Ibadan in Nigeria, Khartoum in Sudan, and Makerere in Uganda."
"Decades of neglect, political uncertainty and violence," Denardo laments, "have left these institutions in a poor state and forced a large number of the region's most able mathematicians and scientists to pursue their careers elsewhere."
The problem, as many observers see it, is that professors have been unable to engage in the kind of research and teaching that their colleagues in many other parts of the world take for granted. Meanwhile, students have been unable to enrol in courses or conduct laboratory experiments that would allow them to gain the knowledge and skills they need to become successful mathematicians and scientists.
"Studies," adds Denardo, "show that when a mathematician or scientist from a developing country, particularly a least developed country (LDC), stays away from his or her country for several years, he or she is unlikely ever to return on a permanent basis." To stem this chronic brain drain phenomenon, institutions, including ICTP, have turned to a strategy that requires students to remain enrolled in universities in their home countries while still enjoying access to state-of-the-art science facilities and people elsewhere.
"The strategy we have adopted for the Mori Fellowship programme," says Sreenivasan, "works like this: Participants matriculate in institutions in their home countries but can visit ICTP---and other scientific institutions in Trieste---for extended periods over three successive years to participate in research and training activities and engage in discussions with eminent scientists. In fact, all students will be assigned two supervisors-one from their home country and another from a Trieste-based scientific institution."
"Beyond the immediate benefits it provides to participating students," Sreenivasan continues, "we anticipate that the programme will have a substantial 'multiplying' effect as those who earn their degrees assume teaching responsibilities in their home countries. Over time, more and more young African students interested in science and mathematics will benefit."
ICTP is no stranger to such a strategy, which is often called a "sandwich" programme. Charles Chidume, a staff member of ICTP's mathematics group, launched a Centre-supported "sandwich programme in mathematics" at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. The programme has since provided support to 10 students, who have spent roughly half of their time in their home institutions and half at ICTP.
Similarly, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna joined ICTP in launching an ICTP/IAEA Sandwich Training and Educational Programme (STEP) in 2004 to provide research and training opportunities in a wide variety of fields in physics and mathematics to students from developing countries. Under the STEP programme, students spend part of their time at home and part of their time in institutions in Italy. At present, approximately 50 STEP students are enrolled (see "Step by Step," News from ICTP, Spring 2004, pp. 4-5).
"The experience ICTP has acquired through its 'sandwich' programmes over the past several years," says Chidume, "has enabled us to rapidly implement the Mori Fellowship programme."
Ali Bashir, who is a lecturer in mathematics at Bayero University in Kano, Nigeria, the same place where he received his master's degree, arrived in Trieste in early February. His area of specialty is functional and nonlinear analysis. He hopes that his three extended visits to ICTP over the next three years-each for about six months-will enable him to obtain his Ph.D degree from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, by 2008.
Other students, all seeking advanced degrees, will soon follow:
-- Paulina Ekua Amponsah, a lecturer at the Department of Geology, University of Ghana, Legon, and principal seismologist at Ghana's Geological Survey Department, Accra, who examines earthquake hazards and mitigation strategies in Africa by developing ground motion simulation models that help to determine potential seismological behaviour on the continent.
-- Oluwayomi Peace Faromika, an assistant lecturer at the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria, who specialises in fluid dynamics and, more specifically, the development of mathematical models and computational simulations as tools for blood flow analysis.
-- Brice Rodrigue Malonda Boungou, who was born and raised in Congo and is currently studying for his Ph.D at the University of Douala's Centre for Atomic Molecular Physics and Quantum Optics (CEPAMOQ), in Cameroon. Malonda Boungou's research focusses on condensed matter physics and, more specifically, the electronic and magnetic properties of nanostructures.
-- Uguette Flore Ndongmouo Taffoti, who obtained her Ph.D in November 2005 from the Institute of Mathematics and Physical Sciences in Porto-Novo, Benin, and who focusses her studies on molecular dynamics, particularly as it relates to water absorption of icy surfaces.
-- Folsade Mayowa Olajuyigbe, an assistant lecturer at the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria, who applies laser technology to biological studies, especially for better understanding the enzyme structure, function and dynamics of soil-bound micro-organisms.
-- Mohammed Khalil Salih Saeed, a medical physicist at the Radiation and Isotopes Center in Khartoum, Sudan, who examines dosage levels and improved quality control mechanisms for radiotherapy in order to better protect both patients and medical personnel.
-- Abdulrafiu Tunde Raji, who was born in Nigeria and is now an instructor at University of Cape Town, South Africa. Raji specialises in solid state physics and, more specifically, develops computer simulations to study the ways in which stress, temperature and pressure effect materials and particularly metals.
When Koïchiro Matsuura, director general of UNESCO, who proved instrumental in arranging this grant, announced the launch of the Mori Fellowship programme during a ceremony celebrating Africa Week at UNESCO's headquarters in Paris last May, he noted that Africa is a continent that has enormous scientific talent. Yet, inadequate educational opportunities and the lack of scientific exchange-both within Africa and between Africa and scientific communities abroad-have created serious impediments to nurturing this talent.
The Mori Fellowship programme is designed to overcome these impediments by helping the continent's 'best and brightest' young scientists and mathematicians reach their full potential without having to leave for far-away places from which they may never return.

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