Niyonzima Niyongabo Francois

Dr Niyonzima Niyongabo Francois is a Rwandan Biochemist and Senior Lecturer. He holds a Ph. D. Biochemistry (Jain University, India), MSc Biochemistry (Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University = NMMU, South Africa), and BSc Hons (NMMU, South Africa), and BSc (Mysore University, India). He also has a Postgraduate Certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education (University of Rwanda – College of Education), and a Diploma in Management and Leadership (Maastricht School of Management, Netherlands). He has been teaching biochemistry and chemistry modules for the last 21 years. His main interest is in enzymology. He has supervised more than 100 undergraduate and master dissertations. He has more than 50 publications on various biochemical/chemical/hematological parameters, and enzymes (such as protease, lipase, amylase, asparaginase, nitroreductase, keratinase and pollulanase) in good Journals with impact factor such as Applied Biochemistry and Biotechnology, Brazilian Journal of Microbiology, Preparative Biochemistry and Biotechnology, Biologia, Applied Biochemistry and Microbiology, 3 Biotech, and Journal of Scientific and Industrial Research. He is a Reviewer of Journal of Food Biochemistry, Journal of Basic Microbiology, Journal of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine, Resources, Environment and Sustainability, etc. He has developed 3 projects that were financed by National Council for Science and Technology (NCST-Rwanda) in 3 successive years, viz. 2019, 2020, and 2021. These are “Photochemistry and antibacterial analyses of medicinal plants in Rwanda (Principal Investigator, 50 million Frw)”, “Bioethanol and hand sanitizer production from sugar cane molasses to quickly respond to their local increasing demand towards Covid-19 pandemic (Co-Principal Investigator, 60 million Frw)”, and “Predicting the risk of SARS-Cov2 infection and co-morbidity and reducing socioeconomic impacts: Identification of high risk population (Member, 60 million Frw)”. He is the BoD Advisory member of the African Centre of Excellence in Data Science (ACE-DS) of the University of Rwanda. He has evaluated the application for the promotion to the grade of Senior Lecturer for UR-CST academic staff. He was Higher Education Council (HEC) expert to evaluate various undergraduate and master new programs.