Dr Sanjeev Rambharose, a senior lecturer in the Department of Physiological Sciences, was selected to participate in the Future Professors Programme's (FPP) from 2024 to 2025. The FPP is a flagship programme of the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) to prepare promising early- to mid-career academics for the professoriate through a rigorous, structured, and enriching two-year development process.

We asked Dr Rambharose about his experience of the programme thus far:

It is an intensive programme with training in leadership, individual mentorship, professional coaching, writing retreats, and a 2–4-week international trip. In which of these activities have you engaged already?

The programme has been both comprehensive and intentional in its design, offering a variety of touchpoints to support academic excellence and leadership. To date, I have participated in several of its core components:

• Leadership training and seminars: These have offered invaluable perspectives on academic leadership in both local and global contexts. Led by senior scholars and thought leaders, these sessions challenge participants to think beyond disciplinary silos and reimagine what it means to lead in academia today.
• Individual academic and research mentorship: I've had the privilege of being mentored by both a senior academic mentor and a research mentor. Their insights have significantly enriched my approach to scholarly productivity, publication strategies, and leadership development.
• Professional coaching: This has been one of the most transformative aspects of the programme for me personally. The one-on-one coaching has sharpened my sense of academic identity, supported resilience in the face of institutional complexity, and provided guidance on how best to navigate my career trajectory with purpose and impact.
• Writing retreats: Due to work-related commitments, I've not yet been able to participate fully in the writing retreats. However, colleagues in my cohort who have attended speak highly of the focus and productivity these spaces enable. I plan to participate in at least two retreats in the second half of the year to benefit from this vital component of the programme.
• International visit: I recently completed an enriching academic visit to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) as part of the international engagement component. The experience facilitated deep engagement with leading global scholars, expanded my research network, and opened pathways for potential collaborative projects in both research and postgraduate supervision.

What does it mean to you, on a personal and professional level, to be part of such an enriching programme?

Being part of the FPP has been an extraordinary honour and a profound affirmation of both my work and my potential. On a personal level, it has been a space of encouragement, reflection, and empowerment. It has reaffirmed my academic mission while offering opportunities to refine and elevate my goals within a community of similarly motivated peers.

Professionally, the programme provides access to a cross-disciplinary network of high-performing academics, fostering intellectual exchange that is both generative and expansive. It allows us to engage with the structural, pedagogical, and ethical dimensions of higher education in South Africa and beyond. The DHET's investment through the University Capacity Development Programme is a powerful statement of national intent to nurture a cadre of academics who are not only excellent scholars but also transformative leaders.

Please tell us a bit more about your research – it seems extraordinarily multi-disciplinary?

Yes, my research is inherently multidisciplinary and situated at the intersection of human physiology, pharmaceutics, nanotechnology, drug delivery, and biomedical engineering. The core aim is to design and optimise advanced drug delivery systems that are not only scientifically robust but also responsive to real-world health challenges, particularly in low-resource and global South contexts.

My work spans innovation, sustainability, health equity, and translational science, and requires collaboration across domains such as material science, clinical medicine, and public health. This integrative approach is essential to address the complexity of modern biomedical challenges, from improving therapeutic efficacy to enhancing patient outcomes.

My visit to UIUC further deepened this multidisciplinary ethos. I had the opportunity to engage with researchers in the Department of Molecular and Integrative Physiology, the Holonyak Micro & Nanotechnology Lab, faculty from the Carle Illinois College of Medicine and the Department of Biomedical and Translational Sciences. These interactions were intellectually stimulating and opened exciting possibilities for collaborative research and postgraduate training initiatives.

Anything you would like to add, as a researcher at a South African university, in these days and times?

We are working within a higher education landscape that is both challenging and filled with profound potential. As South African academics, we are called upon to produce world-class scholarship while also ensuring that our work is inclusive, transformative, and grounded in the realities of our context.

The FPP exemplifies this dual imperative. It is more than a capacity-building initiative; it is a vision for a future in which South African scholarship leads globally and serves locally. It fosters the kind of academic leadership that our universities and our country need to navigate a rapidly changing world.

At a time when global inequalities continue to define whose knowledge counts and who has access to opportunity, programmes like the FPP are essential. They help scholars from the global South to stand confidently on the international stage while remaining deeply connected to the communities and institutions they serve.

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