Building bridges across disciplines to grow human capacity
Engineering capacity development over the last 5-10 years (sponsored by Eskom)
Professor Sue Harrison’s love for science was nurtured over family dinner conversations where she was the youngest of a large family of engineers, chemistry buffs and physicists. She began to realise that different disciplines could intersect to achieve better results.
Fast-forward and Harrison is pioneering the way in the field of bioprocess engineering. It’s a specialty that falls under the chemical engineering banner at the University of Cape Town and bridges faculties and industries.
As Director of the Centre for Bioprocess Engineering Research, and holding t he South African Research (SARChI) Chair in Bioprocess Engineering, Harrison integrates the chemical engineering, mineral processing and biotechnology disciplines.
Her research builds a holistic understanding of the biology, engineering and bioprocesses essential to a sustainable bioeconomy. This is based on maximising renewable materials and resource productivity while minimising waste burdens, including the wastewater burden.
Inter-disciplinary approach
Harrison explains that she has developed the bioprocess engineering capacity by considering the integration of fundamental knowledge in engineering and the life sciences as key, further supported by a growing understanding of sustainability science.
To enable this inter-disciplinary approach, students and researchers from different disciplines carry out research and training alongside each other. They develop a strong understanding of and respect for each other’s disciplines while adding to a new knowledge at the fusing of these disciplines.
“T h i s h a s b e e n my approach for over 15 years,” she says. “It’s only recently becoming the accepted approach globally in this field.”
To enable this approach, formal training of bioprocess engineers and technologists has been necessary t hrough t he coursework developed for the MSc(Eng) specialising in bioprocess engineering. The programme has run for over 15 years.
Harrison has also taken an active role i n getting novice postgraduate students research active through training in research methodology and laboratory methods.
Water focus
A number of her projects relate to water, addressing such issues as acid mine drainage, as just one example.
Harrison notes that polluted water has resources in it that are currently discarded, including organic compounds that could be used to help generate as much as 10% of South Africa’s electricity requirements.
Value from waste
This theme of “value from waste” flows through Harrison’s research into using microorganisms for extracting metals from ores and from e-waste, the handling of mine wastes, the use of by-products in agricultural processes (such as the sugar industry) in generating bio-based products and the use of hydrocarbon fractions as feedstock for higher value chemicals.
Another big focus of her work is using algae to take up CO to make biomass and a whole range of products of value.
Broader capacity development
Over the course of her research career, Harrison has supervised 97 postgraduate students to completion, as well as training 11 interns, hosting and mentoring 32 postdoctoral researchers and mentoring 20 emerging researchers and academic staff members, many of whom have achieved professional recognition and excellent academic standing.