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Kanyane Bridgett Malatji
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HIV and Mycobacterium TB cause increased mortality among TB and HIV patients. The diagnosis of HIV and TB is currently done separately and as a result, treatment is delayed, particularly for TB since diagnosis has a long turnaround time. Thus, the project aims to develop a point-of-care assay for multiplex diagnosis of TB and HIV-1 co-infection in human blood using markers for active TB and HIV infection.
Lerato Maboko
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Alzheimer's disease, which is characterised by reduced cholinergic functioning, is generally treated by acetylcholinesterase inhibitors such as donepezil. Although treatment exists, it remains symptomatic and subject to unfavorable adverse effects. Drug discovery is rife with ineffective, cytotoxic, and/or pharmacokinetically unfeasible pharmacophores. The purpose of this study is to assess novel pharmacophores’ in vitro acetylcholinesterase inhibitory, blood-brain barrier permeability and cytotoxic potential.
Keletso Mabel Monareng
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With unprecedented amounts of material data generated from experiments and high-throughput density functional theory, machine learning provides the ability to accelerate the discovery and design of new materials. In this work data-driven density functional theory (DFT), data is employed to develop machine learning models that can predict the densities of sodium-ion battery (SIB) cathode materials. Different machine learning models were successfully developed and validated, using SIB materials’ properties calculated from DFT as input dataset and elemental properties of their constituents. The following models Bayesian ridge, gradient boosting regressor, light gradient boosting machine, extra trees regressor, random forest and orthogonal matching pursuit were developed and evaluated. Extra trees regressor was found to be the best model in predicting density with accuracy measures of 0.95 and 0.09, for coefficient of determination and mean square error, respectively. Thus, the features used have predictive capability with a high accuracy.
Maano Valerie Masiphephethu
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This study focuses on assessing medicinal plants bioactive compounds with potential antimycobacterial and antioxidant activities, where solvents of varying polarities will be used to obtain a wide range of phytochemicals, which can be used in the development of new drugs with less or no side effects and readily available to poor communities.
Pamela Maimela
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Pancreatic cancer ranks amongst the most lethal malignancies worldwide, with an incidence rate almost equal to its mortality rate. The most common tumours, occurring in over 90% of cases, are pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas (PDAC). In cancer, multiple aberrations result in an immune response being elicited, and in the production of autoantibodies against cancer testis antigens, which are proteins with restricted expression to the testis or placenta, but also expressed in cancer. Therefore, correlating specific autoantigen-autoantibody interactions may allude to the host immune response driving the development and progression of PDAC. Furthermore, these may prove to be possible diagnostic markers, or treatment targets. We, therefore, embarked on the analysis of serum to identify PDAC specific signatures and to subsequently determine their role and function in the pathogenesis of this malignancy, through a high parallel and high throughput microarray platform.
Lindokuhle Christopher Mhlongo
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Dairy production is expensive to maintain due to the high cost of animal feed. There is a need for inexpensive feed to maintain the nutritional requirement of dairy cows. Black wattle (BW) is an invasive plant that grows during all seasons of the year and is readily available at a reasonable price. BW is a potential feed source that can be used to supplement the dietary requirements of dairy cows. However, it cannot be immediately incorporated in animal feeds as there is still not enough information on its feeding value. This study investigates the impact of the inclusions of BW in maize silage on the feed intake and milk production of dairy cows.
Rethabile Makole
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The study is about investigating the gas sensing characteristics of p-n heterostructures for possible application as BTEX compounds gas sensors.
Boitumelo Nthwane
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The study was focuses on preparing a low-cost nanomaterial from modified agricultural waste using a hydrothermal method for the removal of lead ion in wastewater and test the effectiveness of its reuse in blood fingerprint detection.
Masele Mankge
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Alkaline proteases are enzymes with important industrial uses. They can be applied in detergents, leather degumming, food and feed industry, X-ray recovery and in pharmaceuticals. There is ongoing research for proteases, which can meet industrial demands and remain stable under harsh industrial conditions, such as high temperature and pH. Most sources explored include microorganisms isolated from various soil and water sources. Endophytes: micro-organisms that have an endosymbiotic relationship with plants and can produce a plethora of secondary metabolites, remain a largely unexplored source of proteases. Thus, the main aim of this research is to screen for production of alkaline proteases from endophytes, to characterise and identify potential biotechnological applications.
Ntombifuthi Hlatshwayo
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This project is about the pre-treatment of South African bituminous coal fines waste using an oxidising agent, hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) in the presence of ultraviolet light. The aim of the pre-treatment is to increase the abundance of solvent-extractable matter in coal so that it can be degraded by microorganisms during coal bioconversion because coal is a bio recalcitrant, complex and insoluble geopolymer, which is not readily degraded by microorganisms during the biogenic production of methane gas. This study characterised the compositional changes of organic compounds released from coal pre-treated with H2O2 at different concentrations: 3, 6 and 9% (v/v). The 3% (v/v) H2O2 pre-treatment has increased the abundance of solvent-extractable matter (oxygen-containing compounds) in the coal and resulted in 20 wt.% solubilisation compared to the other concentrations. Short chain acids were detected in the dissolved fraction, which are known to be good methanogenic substrates. These findings offer a good basis for coal solubilisation as a key starting point for biogenic production of methane gas.
