The Academy of Pharmaceutical Society of South Africa held its 42nd annual national conference at Zimbali Resort, Durban, KwaZulu natal. The conference which was hosted by University of KwaZulu Natal, took place from the 31st of August 2023 to the 2nd of September 2023. In attendance were top researchers in Pharmaceutical Sciences from across the nine Pharmacy schools in the country. Different master’s students from across the country presented their work and competed for the Young Scientist Award. This is an award, given annually at the conference, in recognition of creativity and excellence among young scientist, as evidenced by their research work.
Mr. Emmanuel Kiyonga, who is a Master of Pharmacy student at the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences in the School of Pharmacy won the young scientist award for his research titled, “Co-crystal systems for solubility enhancement of Raloxifene HCl in Breast cancer and osteoporosis therapy.” This is a historical achievement given that this is the first time a student from the School of Pharmacy at SMU has won since the introduction of the award in 1981.
Prior to winning this award, Mr Kiyonga also won first place for postgraduate podium presentation at the SMU research day in 2023. One of the critical aspects of his study is to come up with a novel Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient that can improve the oral bioavailability and clinical effectiveness. Mr Kiyonga is currently conducting further evaluation and optimization of the co-crystal that has been developed. Mr. Kiyonga is supervised by Mr. Madan Poka and co-supervised by Dr. Bwalya Witika from SMU, Professor Yahya Choonara and Professor Pradeep Kumar from WITS. In response to his award, Mr. Kiyonga said that….
“I feel proud and at the same time humbled. Winning such a prestigious award is not something I even imagined. All thanks to the team effort from all presenters at the conference from the department of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the School of pharmacy, SMU”.
“We dominated the conference with our various ground-breaking research. The calibre of research work presented from all SMU presenters indicated that the winner of the award had to be from SMU. I feel honoured to be the one who won the award on behalf of the team. This was a dream come true for me. This is the greatest lifetime achievement I have ever received, and I know it will go with me for life. I also believe it is the gate way to so many opportunities for me in the academic world”.
The Department and School takes pride in this achievement as it showcased the talent and innovative research taking place at SMU.
