International Partners & Collaborators

International Partnership

  1. International Science Program- Uppsala University, Sweden. Read more at https://www.isp.uu.se/.

ISP assists low and lower-middle income countries to build and strengthen research capacity and higher education in the basic sciences chemistry, physics and mathematics. We have had cordial relationship and support from The International Programme in the Physical Sciences (IPPS), on of the Programs of ISP since 1993. The program continued supporting research activities at the Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology (INST) after IAEA closed the X-ray Laboratory and Nuclear instrumentation Projects in 1988. A major credit is support to Institute manpower development, grants for international conference attendance, fellowships for sandwich programs, gender support, visiting professors etc.

 

  1. International atomic Energy Agency, UN, Vienna, Austria. Read more at https://www.iaea.org/

The IAEA was created in 1957 in response to the deep fears and expectations generated by the discoveries and diverse uses of nuclear technology. Its genesis was U.S. President Eisenhower’s “Atoms for Peace” address to the General Assembly of the United Nations on 8 December 1953. It is mandated through statutes to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity throughout the world. It shall ensure, so far as it is able, that assistance provided by it or at its request or under its supervision or control is not used in such a way as to further any military purpose. Among its many functions is the encouragement of exchange and training of scientists and experts in the field of peaceful uses of atomic energy. Kenya became a member state of IAEA in 1965. In 1970s, Kenya Government through the National Council for Science and Technology (NCST), currently National Commission of Science Technology and Innovation (NACOSTI) invited IAEA to implement research facilities for peaceful use of nuclear science in the University of Nairobi. That was the origin of INST after progressive growth from a project to a unit in the name of Centre for Nuclear Science Techniques (CNST), under the Faculty of Engineering in 1984 to a fully-fledged Institute in the College of architecture and Engineering in 1994.  The initial projects were closed in 1988 but INST continued to benefit from IAEA through African Regional Co-operative Agreement (AFRA) for Research, Development and Training Related to Nuclear Science and Technology and later country specific projects under IAEA Department of Technical Cooperation.

  1. Prof. Erik Kelder, Research Group of Storage of Electochemical Energy, Department of Radiation Science and Technology, Delft University of Technology, Netherlands. Read more at https://www.tudelft.nl/tnw/over-faculteit/afdelingen/radiation-science-technology

Prof. Kelder is the main supervisor of Ms Lindah K. Kiriinya, A tutorial fellow (TF) University of Nairobi (UoN), on PhD scholarship at Delft University of Technology. He is also a co-supervisor of Ms Susan W. Karuga, another UoN TF and a PhD student on a sandwich program in the same university. Erik delivered a full PhD level course, Functional Ceramics, at INST in 2018 which was mainly a technology transfer course and it benefited the two students and many others.

  1. Prof. Prabhu Rajagopal, Department of Mechanical Engineering, IIT Madras, Chennai, India. Read More at https://www.iitm.ac.in/academics/departments/department-of-mechanical-engineering

Prof. Prabhu Rajagopal supports Mr. John K. Birir and Wilson M. Kairu UoN TFs in his capacity as a key supervisor and host of the students when in India. Prior to joining IIT Madras Prabhu worked as a post-doctoral researcher at Imperial College London where he developed hybrid modeling techniques for ultrasonic inspection of welds on a Rolls Royce funded project. While in the UK he served as a co-consultant to companies including BAE systems, British Energy Ltd and Frazer Nash Consultancy. He is currently the principal investigator in a BRNS sponsored project on advanced NDE techniques for the nuclear industry, a four-year European Union FP-7 funded international collaborative project on the health monitoring of wind farms and a DST-funded four-year Indo-German consortium project on the inspection of adhesive bonded joints for the public transport bus industry. His areas of expertise include guided ultrasonic inspection, modeling of elastic wave phenomena and analysis of wave scattering. Read more at https://mech.iitm.ac.in/meiitm/personnal/prabhu-rajagopal/

  1. Cdr (Prof) Jacques Bezuidenhout, Faculty of Military Science, Stellenbosch University, Saldanha Campus, South Africa. Read More at http://www.sun.ac.za/english/faculty/milscience/Pages/Department-for-Physics.aspx

 

Prof. Jacques Bezuidenhout is a professor of Physics with a wide experience in teaching and research in Geophysics, primarly in Applied Radiation Physics. He is a key supervisor of Mr. Kennedy K. Kilel, a UoN PhD student, on a sandwich scholarship. He is also the Lead Project Reader of an IAEA-INST-Stellenbosh University triangular project on investigation of natural radionuclides as tracers for monitoring sediment processes in South Africa and Kenya.

  1. Cdr (Prof) Jacques Bezuidenhout, Prof. August Andersson, Department of Environmental Science, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden. Read more at https://www.aces.su.se/

Prof. August has established himself well in the field of Environmental Science. His experience and knowledge is well pronounced in his 78 papers in international peer reviewed journals, 63 of which were published in the last 10 years. His achievements are further amplified in his being a reviewer of a substantial number of high impact international journals including Nature and Geophysical Research. He currently supervising two alumni of University of Nairobi, Mr. Leonard Kirago (PhD students) and Samuel Gaita (Postdoc).

  1. Professor Francis Pope, Chair of Atmospheric Science, School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, University of Birmingham, UK. Read more at https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/.

Prof. Pope is an expert on the causes and effects of atmospheric pollution. He holds a Birmingham Fellowship which allows outstanding, high potential researchers to establish world leading research groups (currently 2 Postdocs, 10 PhDs, 2 Masters students). He has generated funding in excess of £2 M, from research councils (UK and EU) and government agencies. He has led four multi- institute and multinational projects to completion. Most recently, the A System Approach to Air Pollution (ASAP) Project (https://www.asap.uk.com) on air pollution that involved UK, Ethiopian, Kenyan (Students and INST faculty) and Ugandan partners. He provides policy directed research on road pollution (related to the VW scandal) for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Transport Scotland, and the Department for Transport. He has a wide experience in research and has published widely (h index = 18, more than 43 peer reviewed papers, 4 book chapters and 3 government reports). He is an editor for the prominent ‘Atmospheric Measurement Techniques’ journal and a convener for the largest European environmental conference (EGU) which attracts over 15,000 delegates. Besides partnership in collaborative research, he supervised MSc research for Mr. David Ng’ang’a to completion nd has mentored many INST students.

  1. Dr. Joshua Vande Hey, Earth Observation Group, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leicester, UK. Read More at https://le.ac.uk/earth-observation-science

Dr. Vande Hey the Principal Investigator (PI) working together with Prof. Madara Ogot, Kenya PI, of the Newton Fund Project to which INST is involved. One of the INST MSc student, Mr. Ezekiel Nyaga, was trained in air pollution modelling in the group at University of Leicester. Together with Joshua’s collaborator, Dr. Rebecca Cordell from School of Chemistry, a sampling campaign of VOCs on two major roads in Nairobi was carried out.

  1. Prof. Laura Borgess, Chemistry for Technologies Laboratory, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Brescia, Brescia, Italy. Read more at http://drimi.unibs.it/

Prof. Borgese is the main Coordinator of the European Network for Chemical Elemental Analysis by Total Reflection X-Ray Fluorescence” (ENFORCE-TXRF) CA18130. The network is a European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) project where INST is an International Partners. The main aim and objective of the Network is to coordinate the efforts made at the national and transnational level to establish total reflection X-ray fluorescence (TXRF) as a reference technique for reliable elemental analysis of solid and liquid matrices, both for screening and accurate quantitative determination, building capacity by training, connecting and involving stakeholders.  One of INST alumnus, Ms Anne Mutahi, is a PhD student of Laura who we co-supervise. Red more at http://chem4tech.unibs.it/.   

  1. Assistant Research Professor, Dan Westervelt, Ph.D, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, New York, USA. Read More at https://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/.

Dr. Westervelt is an Associate Research Scientist and a Columbia University Climate and Life Fellow leading a project on air pollution and climate change in Africa. He is also an affiliated scientist with the NASA Goddard Institute of Space Studies in New York, NY, and an air pollution advisor to the US State Department. He previously worked as a Science, Technology, and Environmental Policy (STEP) postdoctoral research associate at Princeton University. He obtained his PhD degree in May 2013 in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. Dan has invited INST to participate in his current project with Department of State to study air pollution in East Africa and an NRF network project on atmospheric studies. Read more at https://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~danielmw/.

  1. Dr. Sarah Benki-Nugent, Departments of Global Health and Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, University of Washington, Washington, USA.
  1. Prof. Luewton Agostinho, VHL University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands.
  2. Faculty of Health Sciences, School of Health Systems and Public Health, University of Pretoria, South Africa.
  3. Stockholm Environmental Institute, Nairobi, Kenya, Branch of York University, UK.
  4. African Group on Atmospheric Science, Regional IGAC Branch, Pretoria, South Africa

International Collaborators

  1. Prof. Jan Marjinissen, University of Florinda, USA.
  2. Prof. Erik Kelder, Delft University of Technology, Netherlands.
  3. Prof. Prabhu Rajagopal, IIT Madras, Chennai, India.
  4. Prof. Johan Boman, University of Gothenburg, Sweden
  5. Prof. Francis Pope, University of Birmingham, UK.
  6. Dr. Andrea Mazzeo, University of Birmingham, UK.
  7. Prof. Örjan Gustafsson, Stockholm University, Sweden.
  8. Dr. August Andersson, Stockholm University, Sweden.
  9. Prof. Luewton Agostinho, VHL University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands.
  10. Dr. Vande Hey, Joshua D., University of Leicester, UK.
  11. Dr.  Rebecca Cordell, University of Leicester, UK.
  12. Prof. Eloise Marais, University College London, UK.
  13. Dr. Dan Westervelt, Columbia University, New York, USA.
  14. Dr. R Subramanian, Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Doha, Qatar.
  15. Dr. Sarah Benki-Nugent, University of Washington, Washington, USA.
  16. Prof. Rebecca Garland, The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, South Africa.
  17. Prof. Jacques Bezuidenhout, Stellenbosch University, South Africa.