Profile: Dr. Bernice Yram Danu is a lecturer in the Department of Chemical Sciences, University of Energy and Natural Resources, Sunyani. She holds a BSc (Hons) in Physics from the Department of Physics, KNUST (2011), an MPhil and PhD in Solid State Physics from the same Department in 2015 and 2021 respectively. Her PhD studies was on a multidisciplinary topic on polymer-based nanocomposites for wastewater remediation, focusing on organic dyes.
Her academic journey has been enriched through international research collaborations, including a Royal Society-DIFD Africa Capacity Building Initiative Grant, which enabled her to conduct research at the University of Manchester in 2017. Additionally, during her PhD, she was part of a research team that secured the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science Research Fund (KReF 2020), funding research on bio-based materials for organic dye removal in wastewater treatment that produced some published work in this area of research. She has won some awards for her research, which include the third prize winner of the Research presentations at the 2021 Female Minds in STEM (FeMS) Bootcamp, second best poster presenter at the Africa Capacity Building Initiative (ACBI) International Conference in Honour of Prof. O’Brien: Materials for Renewable and Sustainable Energy: From Research to Development, KNUST and the first runner up of the SCISA Woman Challenge at the Maiden WISCA Challenge, KNUST. She currently has 63 citations, an i10 and h-index of 2 and 4 respectively. She has also collaborated on a research work on the use of photocatalysis in water treatment. Dr. Danu is a Solid State Physicist and Material Scientist with research interests in synthesis and characterization of bio-based nanomaterials for wastewater remediation via adsorption and photocatalysis.
Dr. Danu has supervised and mentored over 50 undergraduate students and served as an external supervisor for some postgraduate students. Her MPhil research work explored the annealing- induced phase changes and variations that may occur in the optical properties of CuS and CuSe thin films synthesized by CBD technique. The results suggested significant changes in the structural and optical properties of these thin films due to annealing which may be vital to its use as alternative materials for photovoltaic application. During her undergraduate degree, she was a recipient of the best female student award under the Dr. K.C Whittaker Endowment Fund Scholarship at the Department of Physics, KNUST, during 2009-2011 and 2012- 2014 respectively.
She is currently the first and only female PhD in Solid State Physics from KNUST and in Ghana. Dr. Danu is passionate about teaching, research and impacting knowledge to her students. As a strong advocate for women in STEM, Dr. Danu has volunteered in mentoring girls in the WiSTEMGH/KNUST STEM Camp for Girls in 2019, Project Kuongoza for Young Women and Girls in 2020/2021 respectively and Female Minds in STEM (EFeMS) Mentorship Program (2021). She has actively participated in STEM outreach programs and pioneered initiatives encouraging young girls to explore physics and material science. She single-handedly organized a STEM/Physics outreach at the Notre Dame Girls Senior High School to encourage the young girls to pursue STEM/physics related fields and also demystify the misconceptions about such fields. She believes that the study of science should be interconnected with its application in the industries which will benefit the society.