​His innovative work in TB diagnostics earned Dr Novel Chegou the Emerging Research Talent award at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation – Merck African Research Summit (UNESCO-MARS) held in Geneva, Switzerland.

Awards were presented to the top abstracts from the 100 summit participants. Dr Chegou is a senior researcher at the DST-NRF Centre for Excellence in Biomedical TB Research in the Division of Molecular Biology and Human Genetics at Stellenbosch University's Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences and his research focuses on host serum protein biosignatures for the diagnosis of TB.

"We are trying to develop a new TB diagnostic tool that can be used as a point-of-care test, even in remotest areas in Africa," says Dr Chegou.

"It is humbling to be recognised for the work that you do. But it is not only about me, it is a team effort, and I am very grateful to my colleagues. It is only possible because of the environment that I am working in: from the excellent colleagues that go into the communities to collect the samples, to the research assistants working in the laboratory, and Prof Gerhard Walzl's excellent leadership of the research group," says Dr Chegou.

He was trained as a medical laboratory scientist at the University of Buea in Cameroon and in 2005 joined Stellenbosch University's Immunology Research Group where he completed his Hons. BSc degree. While working on his MSc, which was later upgraded to a PhD, he identified and patented a biosignature obtained from Quantiferon supernatants to discriminate between the active Mycobacterium Tuberculosis (MTB) disease and latent MTB infection.

"This was the first patent that we had [Profs Walzl and Paul Van Helden, Gill Black and myself as Chegou] and I have since contributed to four other patents on diagnostic biosignatures for TB disease," says Dr Chegou.

Photo caption: Dr Novel Chegou received the Emerging Research Talent award at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation – Merck African Research Summit (UNESCO-MARS) held in Geneva, Switzerland

This article appeared in the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences' digital publication VIVUS. Visit www.sun.ac.za/FMHSpublications to subscribe.