In preparation for the upcoming 5th Commonwealth Chemistry Poster conference on September 11-12th 2024, we wanted to celebrate the accomplishments of a selection of our past poster prize winners.
Please find below an interview conducted with 2023 Commonwealth Chemistry Poster conference winner Yahaya Yakubu from Kaduna State University, who won a prize in the Good Health and Wellbeing category for the poster entitled “Exploring Solvent Effect on Chemical Profile and Invitro Anti plasmodial Activity of Root Extracts of an Under Explored African Plant; Triplochiton scleroxylon” You can check out Yahaya Yakubu’s poster in our online gallery here.
Yahaya Yakubu, Kaduna State University
Bio
Yahaya Yakubu, PhD is a Researcher and Lecturer in the Department of Pure and Applied Chemistry at Kaduna State University in Nigeria.
What made you decide to study chemistry?
Right from my formative years, I had wanted to study Chemistry because I had realized it is a course that covers all expects of life and the world itself.
What aspect of your work are you most excited about and what do you find most challenging about your research?
I am excited about the fact that the outcome of the pilot study was positive in that it showed the prospect of managing malaria and that will pave the way for future work on the plant. As such, it is a novel finding as regards the plant since is virtually less explored scientifically for that purpose.
What I find most challenging is that there are no laid down or related results for comparison from the same plant as such one will have to verify and double-confirm a particular result on any aspect of work done in this regard before issuing it out.
© Yahaya Yakubu
If you could meet one chemist throughout history and ask them one question, who would it be and what would you ask them?
Antoine Lavoisier. I will ask him what inspired his different research.
In no more than 50 words, explain how your research contributes to the UN SDGs.
We focus on efficient remedies/cures for resistant malaria which has become a worrisome trend worldwide. This is key because one of the SDGs’ central goals is to promote good health and well-being by controlling or eliminating malaria threatening all ages before the year 2030.
What are the future directions for your research?
At the moment we have conducted an in silico study on the most active fraction and are currently writing a manuscript to that effect which we hope to send for publication anytime soon.
We hope to:
– Conduct an in vivo assay using the same plant
– Metabolomics/molecular network approach of the work
– Isolate and characterize the active compound with the view of conducting the same assay
– Conduct a structure-activity relationship using the same assay
What or who motivates/inspires you?
Nature is one of my biggest motivations and also my passion to contribute my little quota to the betterment of humanity through chemistry.
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