Posted by By BEN OKEZIE on
A Nigerian policewoman has become a pearl among women in the field of science, as she bags an international award for an outstanding project.
A Nigerian policewoman has become a pearl among women in the field of science, as she bags an international award for an outstanding project. Superintendent of Police Aisha Abubakar Abdulwahab, a 34-year-old mother of two has won the United Nations Educational and Scientific Organisation (UNESCO) Awards - L'Oreal Fellowship 2005 for young women in life sciences.
According to a UNESCO letter attached to her certificate, Mrs Abdulwahab won the award with her unique scientific project that would see her examining genetic similarities between human and bovine tuberculosis.
Mrs Abdulwahab, who is among three eminent African women that received UNESCO Awards this year, will proceed to any foreign university of her choice to complete her laboratory research work, which the international body described as 'a scientific classic."
Trying to link the prevalence of tuberculosis to the consumption of milk extracted from rural cattle, Mrs Abdulwahab believes that many Nigerians have endangered their lives by drinking unpasteurised milk.
The research work would determine whether cross-contamination has occurred in Nigeria, by taking samples from tuberculosis patients and infected cattle. She will screen them by extracting milk and blood samples. She will then isolate and characterize the different strains of human and bovine mycobacterium in the samples and extract their DNA.
Mrs Abdulwahab joined the Nigeria Police Force as an ASP, after her service year in 1995. She is a veterinary medicine graduate of Ahmadu Bello University with a doctorate degree in Public Health.
The other two African women who bagged UNESCO Awards are Mrs Kirakoya Fati of Burkina Faso and Mrs Boni Cisse, Catherine of Cote d'Ivoire.