Alamba PhD akiwa na miaka 22

[epigenetics]

At a time when many his age would thank their stars for being able to acquire a first degree and some dare to acquire a second one instead of looking for a job, Dr. Nkem Karl Omebere-Iyari has distinguished himself as an exceptionally gifted Nigerian. At the recent Graduation Ceremonies of the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom, Omebere-Iyari who turns 23 on the 16th of this month, bagged a Ph.D in Chemical Engineering. The degree had been completed in a record time of 36 months, straight from his first degree and with a EU Grant of £17, 000 per year for the three years.

Those who know his antecedents would not have expected anything less. The son of the Central Bank's Deputy Director, Banking Operations, Mr. James Omebere Iyari had graduated with a First Class Honours Degree in Chemical Engineering at the age of 19 in 2003. He was the best graduating student in Chemical Engineering that year. Before then, he had attended the Oxbridge Tutorial College, Ikeja, Lagos, where he sat for the Cambridge Advanced Level examinations in Physics, Mathematics, and Chemistry at the age of 16 in 2000, scoring A in all three. Yet before then, he had attempted the Cambridge GCE ‘O’ level examination, at the age of 14, in June 1998 and got six credits.

At the end of his Senior Secondary education at the King's College, Lagos, Omebere-Iyari, then 16 had eight As, including five A1s. Ironically, he never got his UME scores. The results of the examination, which he wrote at a centre in Epe, Lagos were cancelled along with others in that centre. His father, who also had a Second Class Upper Division in Business Administration from the University of Benin, said at the weekend that, since his son did well in the Cambridge ‘O’ and ‘A’ levels, as well as the SAT and TOEFL, where he scored over 80 and 90 percent respectively, the family decided that he should go to the UK.

The first of three sons, the native of Owanta in the Ika North-East Local Government Area of Delta State had won many academic laurels from his primary school days at the CBN Primary School, Satellite Town, Lagos. He did his internship with Procter and Gamble, Brussels, Belgium in 2002. Through a European Union funding, he was also at SINTEF Laboratory, one of the world’s leading Flow facilities at Trondheim, Norway in 2004; and German Nuclear Research Centre at Dresden, last year. Omebere-Iyari has participated in several seminars and workshops in the UK and Europe, while his articles in Chemical Engineering have been published in International Journals. He currently works as Process Engineer/Consultant at KBR Company, a subsidiary of Haliburton Group at Leatherhead, UK.

Should Omebere-Iyari not come home to contribute his knowledge and skills to the development of the country? He could not be reached to answer this question, but his father said, "He is a very patriotic Nigerian and is interested in the development of the country. But he wants to get further international experience before coming back home."
Iyari, who also holds a Diploma in Petroleum Refining Technology could not imagine what would have been his son’s lot if he had remained here. ìRight from his first year in the university, all his designs were computer based. We should try and develop the education sector in the country so that our youths can realise their full potentials. Whether in the Arts, Social Science or the Sciences, our school libraries and laboratories should be well-equipped. Computers should be made available to the students.’ He sees his son as an inspiration to his peers, that they can achieve whatever goals they set for themselves as long as they remain focussed and work hard.

The proud mother, Pastor Kikanwa Omebere-Iyari, who is also a business woman and farmer, said, ìHe has made us proud and I tell him it to his face. For him to be so God-fearing and well-behaved even when I was not there, young as he was, I thank God.”

Mr. Iyari said their other children are high fliers too. The second son is a Part Two Student of Economics at the Dakar Campus of the Suffolk University, Boston, USA, while the last, a Science Student, is in his final year in secondary school.

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http://allafrica.com/stories/200701260832.html
http://www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php?id=67065
http://odili.net/news/source/2007/jan/7/200.html

CV ya jamaa:
http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/nkem-karl-omebere-iyari/8/957/3b6

 

[Bulesi]

Kama ndoto ya marehemu Prof. Leonard Shayo ya kuanzisha kijiji cha gifted students pale Arusha isingezimwa na watu wasionaupeo wa maendeleo,hata sisi sasa tungeweza kuwa na vijana kama huyu!! Kuchanganya mambo ya siasa, wivu pamoja na Professioalism ndio kulikosababisha kijiji hicho kisijengwe ingawa kilipata baraka za Baba wa taifa!!

 

[Mdondoaji]

Safi sana

 

[Katoma]

Kama ndoto ya marehemu Prof. Leonard Shayo ya kuanzisha kijiji cha gifted students pale Arusha isingezimwa na watu wasionaupeo wa maendeleo,hata sisi sasa tungeweza kuwa na vijana kama huyu!! Kuchanganya mambo ya siasa, wivu pamoja na Professioalism ndio kulikosababisha kijiji hicho kisijengwe ingawa kilipata baraka za Baba wa taifa!!

Kuna mtu anaweza kutupatia background na stage iliyofikiwa mpaka kuzimwa kwa hicho kijiji kilichotaka kuanzishwa na marehemu Prof. Shayo? What were the setbacks? Tunaweza kufufua huo mpango.

 

[epigenetics]

Huyu aliipata yake Univ of Cambridge akiwa na miaka 23.

From atoms to Africa: Soboyejo tackles problems, inspires students

By Hilary Parker




From the beginning, Winston Oluwole Soboyejo has been of two worlds - the developing and the developed.

Born in Palo Alto, Calif., on the day Sir Winston Churchill died, Soboyejo's first name is after the charismatic former prime minister of the United Kingdom. But he has always gone by Wole, the abbreviated form of his middle name, a traditional name of the Yoruba tribe of western Nigeria. It was there that Soboyejo lived from age 1 to 13, headed toward a career as one of the world's leading materials scientists.

"I was inspired by growing up in a developing country, by seeing the problems people have and coming up with ways to tackle them," said Soboyejo, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering.

His outlook is global not only in terms of geography, but in the challenges he addresses and the way he approaches them. Soboyejo's ongoing, and simultaneous, research projects address problems in the areas of human health, sustainable energy and nanotechnology, to name just a few. Many of these initiatives combine the talent and expertise of scientists throughout the world through the U.S./Africa Materials Institute (USAMI), which Soboyejo founded and directs.

When he is not abroad establishing collaborations and conducting research, Soboyejo can often be found in the EQuad Café, deep in conversation with students. He is known for his ability to imbue his protégés not only with engineering skills, but with the desire to use them to improve lives throughout the world. Based on student evaluations, he was named to the engineering school's Commendation List for Outstanding Teaching for the spring 2006 semester.

"Professor Soboyejo seems to have unlimited energy and enthusiasm for the progress of materials research and education in the developing world," said Himanshu Jain, a USAMI member and professor of engineering at Lehigh University. Jain and Soboyejo collaborate on a project that involves researchers from five universities in four countries (located on three continents) to develop a glass that can be used as a scaffold for regrowing injured bone.

Soboyejo and members of the Global Development Network
A common sight in the EQuad Café, Soboyejo and members of the Global Development Network discuss their plans to share sustainable technologies with developing nations. Pictured are, from left, juniors Daniel Cohen and Ishani Sud; Jonathan Gartside, an exchange student from the University of Oxford; Soboyejo; and senior Thomas Woodson. (Photos by Denise Applewhite)

"I am always amazed at his ability to think at the continental level and at the atomic level at the same time," Jain said. "There are few leaders who have insight into the international issues and detailed scientific understanding of their research at the same time."

A lifetime of interest

Winston Oluwole Soboyejo started young.

As a child, he carefully watched his father, a Yoruba chief named Alfred Soboyejo, use the tools of mechanical engineering to advance Nigerian development. Then an engineering professor at the University of Lagos and the head of an engineering consulting company, Alfred Soboyejo recognized in his son the signs of a budding engineer from early on.

"We'd buy him lots of toys even though he would ruin them within two days, taking them to pieces to figure out how they worked," recalled the elder Soboyejo, who left Nigeria in 1995 to join the engineering faculty at Ohio State University. "By age 5, he would come to my office and use his pen and pencil to scratch on my paper. But I never discouraged him - I just bought him his own small table to set next to mine." From 1966 to 1967, his father spent a year away from 2-year-old Wole as a postdoctoral researcher at Princeton, working with Cemal Eringen, now a professor emeritus of civil engineering and operations research.

At age 13, Wole left Nigeria to attend Kelly College, an English boarding school. His teachers, unconvinced of the merits of engineering, encouraged him to go into law or business. Despite their protests, he went on to earn a B.Sc. in engineering at King's College of London University, at the time planning to return to Nigeria.

"I may have been naïve, but I was quite convinced that engineering really could make a difference in the world," Soboyejo said. "You have to pursue your own dreams - you shouldn't do things because other people think you should."

It was in his final year at King's College that he was introduced to and captivated by the field of materials science and its quest to design new substances with useful properties. His newfound fascination led him not back to Nigeria, but to Churchill College of Cambridge University, where he earned a Ph.D. in the subject in 1988. He was only 23 years old.

After four years as a research scientist in industry, he joined the faculty at Ohio State University in 1992. He later spent a year as a visiting professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology before joining the Princeton faculty in 1999.

Materials for a better world

A longtime dream of Soboyejo's came true in 2003 with the establishment of the USAMI, one of six international materials institutes supported by the National Science Foundation.

"To really engage global development, Africa is the last untapped frontier," Soboyejo said. "Talented scientists are in many cases falling behind because they haven't had access to facilities and resources they need."

The USAMI takes a multi-pronged approach to this challenge. In addition to bringing African scientists to the United States to conduct research in affiliated laboratories, the institute helps establish new research laboratories in Africa. The collaboration was instrumental in creating an organic electronics laboratory in Nigeria, which in turn spurred a national nanotechnology initiative backed by the Nigerian government.

The collaborations supported by the USAMI promise to benefit people throughout the world. Already, institute researchers, including Soboyejo and others at Princeton, have created submicroscopic particles, just a few billionths of a meter wide, that could vastly improve the detection and treatment of breast and prostate cancer.

Designed to selectively attach to sites on tumor cells, the particles may one day allow doctors to detect submillimeter-sized tumors with existing medical imaging technologies. Currently, magnetic resonance imaging techniques can detect tumors only larger than a few millimeters, which already contain hundreds of millions of cancer cells. The team also has incorporated anticancer pharmaceuticals into the particles to deliver the potent chemicals specifically to cancer cells. The research team includes Princeton chemical engineering professors Robert Prud'homme, Athanassios Panagiotopoulos and Yannis Kevrekidis.

The institute's focus on health extends beyond the human body to the well-being of ecosystems and the environment. Conscious of the fact that technological advancement often comes at a price to the environment in many developing nations, Soboyejo is leading efforts through the USAMI to develop sustainable materials for affordable housing and energy-efficient technologies. Based on the work, construction of a photovoltaics laboratory for the production of solar panels is now under way in Nigeria.

In addition to heading the USAMI, Soboyejo chairs the African Science Committee of the African Institute of Science and Technology, part of the Delaware-based Nelson Mandela Institution. The organization seeks to establish four institutes of science and technology in Africa that are modeled on the elite Indian Institutes of Technology.

Sharing his vision with students

Soboyejo is devout in his belief in the importance of education for the countless students he has taught and inspired throughout the world. Over the years, he became an avid proponent of the education to be found outside the classroom walls.

"There is much to be learned by U.S. students who engage in cultural development experiences that broaden their thinking," he said. "When they participate in exchange programs and research opportunities, they don't just go to give. They go to receive some understanding, and they come back better informed about the world."

Randy Bly, a 2004 Princeton graduate, is carrying that broadened understanding forward as a student at the Stritch School of Medicine at Loyola University in Chicago. While at Princeton, Bly took every course offered by Soboyejo and worked with him on his senior thesis project to improve bonding between bone and titanium implants. After graduating, Bly spent the summer in Alexandria, Egypt, to continue the work with renowned tissue engineer Mona Marei, a member of the USAMI. He has since returned to Egypt to conduct research during a break from his medical studies.

"Living in Egypt was an invaluable experience," Bly said. He credits his time abroad, and Soboyejo's influence, with his goal to work internationally as a physician. "Professor Soboyejo has a unique optimism and vision that inspires students."

Soboyejo shares this vision in courses he teaches at Princeton and in Africa, including "Introduction to Bioengineering and Medical Devices," held on the Princeton campus, and "Special Topics in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering: Global Technology," taught as part of the University's semester in Kenya program at the Mpala Research Centre.

"Wole sees the whole picture; he sees first and farther than the average person and takes steps to actualize these visions," said Bernard Aduda, a professor of physics at the University of Nairobi, who co-teaches the global technology course. "This makes him a great but very humble scientific and community leader."

Daniel Rubenstein, chair of Princeton's ecology and evolutionary biology department, said Soboyejo's enthusiasm is contagious and his insights inspiring. Rubenstein conducts research and teaches at Mpala and is currently collaborating with Soboyejo on a water purification project.

"Wole's ability to teach students about the design, the fabrication and the utility of appropriate technology, and what cultural barriers need to be overcome for the technology to work effectively and improve lifestyles, is simply amazing," said Rubenstein, who also is director of the University's Program in African Studies.

Changing lives

Even students who haven't experienced Soboyejo in the classroom have internalized his passion for using engineering to conquer global problems.

Daniel Cohen, now a junior majoring in mechanical and aerospace engineering, was a freshman when he initially heard Soboyejo talk about global development. "This was the first time I'd encountered Professor Soboyejo, and his charisma and unparalleled idealism influenced me to seek him out and see what I could do."

The presentation had a similar effect on fellow juniors Julianne Davis, Ishani Sud and Patricia Li who, along with Cohen, were inspired to create the Global Development Network. Now an officially recognized student group, the organization promotes sustainable technologies in developing nations throughout the world. In January, Sud presented one of the group's projects - ceramic water filters constructed from simple materials, including mud and straw - at a conference in Nigeria.

Senior Thomas Woodson, an electrical engineering major, also presented at the conference, describing research done with Soboyejo to improve the efficiency of solar panels.

"Professor Soboyejo has greatly altered my future plans," said Woodson, who intends to work with Princeton in Africa, Princeton in Asia or the Peace Corps next year. "He has opened my eyes to the world of sustained development technology and has shown me how my engineering and research skills can help other countries become technologically savvy."

That is just the lesson Soboyejo strives to teach.

"Science and engineering really matter to the world - they're not just something abstract you learn to complete problem sets," Soboyejo said.

http://www.princeton.edu/engineering/news/archive/?id=546