Making an imPACT – Poyodi Kola’s journey

During his time as an ICGEB PACTs fellow in the Cancer Genomics Group in Cape Town, Dr. Poyodi Kola from Togo, trained on new Genomics and Proteomics techniques. He has maintained close collaboration with ICGEB, recently starting a Teacher and Researcher position at Togo's Université de Kara.

Through a programme launched in 2021 and targeted at scientists from least developed countries (LDCs), the UN Technology Bank for Least Developed Countries, TWAS and ICGEB paved the way to enhance the scientific competencies of early-career researchers and regulators in countries with low socioeconomic development.

The programme, called PACTs (ProgrAmme of CollaboraTions with LDCs), offered early-career scientists from the 46 LDCs, South-North and South-South exchange visits of up to 6-months at the ICGEB laboratories in Trieste (Italy), New Delhi (India) and Cape Town (South Africa).

Dr. Kola spent six months in Cape Town, working on his project which focused on Molecular investigation of medicinal plant extracts on cancer cell lines. Since his fellowship, Dr. Kola has continued to excel as a promising early-career researcher, also being awarded an ICGEB CRP grant on Evaluation of cell migration, invasion and apoptosis of the fractions of two antiproliferative medicinal plants on prostate cancer cell lines. He will be back at ICGEB Cape Town for three months in early 2025 to continue collaborative research.

'The PACTS fellowship was a great opportunity for me as an early career scientist of a developing country to be immersed in a top class international scientific environnment. The fellowship has aided me in both my scientific and professional career and I am grateful to ICGEB, the UN Tech Bank and TWAS' Dr Kola

Dr. Kola will be participating in the first ICGEB CRP Awardees Meeting in Cape Town in November 2024, to represent the West African nation of Togo where he will present his current research activities.