The inaugural Penn State-Ghana Research Partnerships Seed Grant Program has awarded nine projects that aim to fuel global impact, including crop disease surveillance, removing heavy metals from mining wastewater and understanding multimodal traffic streams.
The program is designed to foster new and sustainable research collaborations between faculty at Penn State and faculty/researchers at Ghanaian research institutions or to strengthen existing ones. The initiative aims to catalyze innovative, interdisciplinary projects that address shared scientific and societal challenges while laying the foundation for future collaborative external funding.
Camelia Kantor, associate director of the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, and Marian Dorcas Quain, deputy director-general of Ghana's Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), both fellows for the National Academie's U.S.-Africa Frontiers of Science, Engineering, and Medicine program, launched the program at the inaugural Penn State and Ghana Symposium: The Power of Partnership, in October of last year.
The symposium brought researchers together to learn from each other, make connections and explore opportunities for additional collaborations, including the seed grant program.
The selected projects include:
"Digital agriculture platform for multi-crop disease surveillance: a Penn State-CSIR Ghana partnership for sustainable production"
- Penn State investigators: Rimonoma Serge Ouedraogo, assistant research professor of entomology; David P. Hughes, Huck Chair in Global Food Security, professor of entomology and of biology; Peter McCloskey, research data analyst
- Ghana collaborators: Victor Acheampong Amankwaah, research scientist and plantain breeder/tissue culture specialist, CSIR-Ghana; and Ruth Naa Ashiokai Prempeh, research scientist, CSIR-Ghana
"Investigating interactions among multimodal traffic streams"
- Penn State investigators: Ilgin Guler, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering
- Ghana collaborators: Williams Ackaah, principal research scientist and associate professor of transport studies, CSIR-Ghana; Emmanuella Adubea Asamoah, assistant research scientist, CSIR-Ghana; Frank Junior Effah, technical officer, CSIR-Ghana
"Capacity building and investigation of the diversity of Ghanaian tomato viruses using next generation sequencing"
- Penn State investigators: Cristina Rosa, professor of plant pathology and of environmental microbiology; and Verónica Román-Reyna, assistant professor of plant pathology and of environmental biology
- Ghana collaborators: Ruth Prempeh, senior research scientist and head of biotechnology, seed and post-harvest, CSIR-Ghana; Michael Osei, principal research scientist, CSIR-Ghana; Belinda Akomeah, research scientist in molecular biology, CSIR-Ghana
"ZEOGOLD: synthesis of zeolite from selected anthill clays for the removal of heavy metals from artisanal gold mining sites"
- Penn State investigators: Ivy Mawusi Asuo, assistant professor of materials science and engineering
- Ghana collaborators: Emmanuel Kwesi Arthur, senior lecturer of material and metallurgical engineering, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology; and Saada Mohammed, research scientist in environmental chemistry and sanitation engineering, CSIR-Ghana
"Toward inclusive agricultural resilience: understanding gendered climate adaptation in northern Ghana"
- Penn State investigators: Nicolas Choquette-Levy, assistant professor of climate risk and decision making; Martina Adjei-Yeboah, doctoral student in geosciences and climate science
- Ghana collaborators: Frank Baffour-Ata, lecturer of environmental sciences, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology
"From udder to market: strengthening milk safety and antimicrobial resistance surveillance in northern Ghana"
- Penn State investigators: Erika Ganda, associate professor of food animal microbiomes; Edward G. Dudley, professor of food science; and Kerry E. Kaylegian, associate research professor emerita of food science
- Ghana collaborators: Joshua W.S. Mogre, research scientist in animal health, CSIR-Ghana; and Jennifer A. A. Yamoah, research scientist in animal health, CSIR-Ghana
"Computer-aided high-throughput screening and synthesis of tailored zeolites for mining wastewater treatment in Ghana"
- Penn State investigators: Nelson Yaw Dzade, assistant professor of energy and mineral engineering; and Olumide Ogunmodimu, assistant professor of energy and mineral engineering
- Ghana collaborators: Bright Kwakye-Awuah, associate professor of physics, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology
"Striga diversity studies and identification of striga-resistant sorghum lines in Ghana"
- Penn State investigators: Jesse R. Lasky, associate professor of biology
- Ghana collaborators: Kenneth Opare-Obouobi, research scientist, CSIR-Ghana; Salim Lamini, plant pathologist, CSIR-Ghana; and Frederick Justice Awuku, assistant research scientist, CSIR-Ghana
"Setting up a new collaboration to establish PlacentaVision in Ghana - an artificial intelligence software for assessing placentas"
- Penn State investigators: Alison D. Gernand, associate professor of nutritional sciences; and Kenneth Selasi Addae, doctoral student in nutritional sciences
- Ghana collaborators: Forster Amphonsah-Manu, clinical director, Ghana Health Service
Funding for the Penn State-Ghana Research Partnerships Seed Grant Program is provided by the CSIR-Ghana; Kwame Nkrumah University of Science; Technology and Eastern Regional Hospital; Penn State's Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences; the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences; the College of Agricultural Sciences; the Eberly College of Science; the College of Health and Human Development; and the College of Engineering.
