Prof Jean M-S Lubuma, former Dean of the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences (NAS), at the University of Pretoria (UP) was recently awarded an A2-rating by the National Research Foundation (NRF).

“I am very excited to receive this A-rating; it means a lot to me, especially because it coincides with the end of both my deanship tenure and formal employment at 65. But, this is no coincidence; I worked very hard and went through all the NRF steps of rating, starting more than 20 years ago as a C3-rated researcher,” Prof Lubuma said when asked how he feels about this exceptional achievement.

Prof Lubuma was the Dean of NAS from March 2015 to September 2019 and is now an Emeritus Professor in the Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics.

“This NRF rating is the acknowledgment of my research that now came full circle.” Prof Lubuma explains that a big part of the research that amounted to this rating is the work on the Nonstandard Finite Difference (NSFD) Method, which he started two decades ago at the former Vista University’s Mamelodi Campus. “It was a historically disadvantaged university where conditions to do research were difficult, and only undergraduate programmes were presented in science. This rating reflects some scores on transformation in that something nice could come from Vista. I have high respect for my collaborators and students and this rating is a recognition for the level of work that we have been doing over the past years.”

This rating is also acknowledgement for the Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics to confirm that UP is number one in mathematics and computer science in South Africa according to the CWTS Leiden Rankings.

Prof Lubuma believes that part of his secret to being a successful researcher is his love for mathematics. `I am passionate about mathematics and I don’t do mathematics randomly. It is my life. My success can also be attributed to the fact that I am blessed to work with good collaborators and students.”

“From 2013 to 2015, when I was the founding Chair Holder of the DST/NRF SARChI Chair in Mathematical Models and Methods in Bioengineering and Biosciences, my focus was to unify the analytical, modelling and computational power of mathematics with experimental investigations to elucidate biological processes that result in particular observed phenomena. This again links back to my research field of NSFD method, which is a powerful tool to address complex problems of the society within the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).”

“It was not easy to achieve an A-rating while being dean of such a high-profile and diverse faculty. I was the SARChI Chair holder when I had to decide to apply for the deanship. I had a serious dilemma. If I become dean, I would die scientifically – it could not be both. If I do not apply now, I would never be a dean in my life as I was at four years from retirement. After careful consideration, I decided to apply, with a strong commitment to be a good dean and to flourish scientifically.

“How did I manage? By applying strict time management and working at least 12 hours daily, including saying goodbye to weekends. It was important for me to be very focused on my research – focusing on the marriage between mathematics and biology, with its ramifications on SDGs. I had to sacrifice many things in many aspects of my life in the past five years to make time for my research. My wife, Passy, also gave me endless support to do my best. Above all, I was relying on our Lord Jesus Christ, not doing this on my own – He guides me: it is Opus Dei.”

Prof Lubuma received his PhD from the Université Catholique de Louvain in Belgium in 1985 and was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Abdus-Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) in Italy. He also served as Head of the Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics at UP from 2004 to 2013.

His research trajectory is aligned with Joel Cohen’s well-known statement: “Mathematics is Biology’s next microscope, only better; Biology is Mathematics’ next Physics, only better”. After completion of his PhD thesis and for many years, he worked on partial differential equations models in physics and engineering. Shortly after joining the former Vista University in 1996, his research focus shifted to the mathematical modelling of biological processes.

Prof Lubuma has published extensively in prestigious journals, contributed to major conferences in the field and delivered several keynote addresses on topics that lie at the intersection of mathematical modelling of real-life situations and a spectrum of mathematical specialisations, broadly located within analysis, such as distributions, dynamical systems, partial differential equations, integral equations and numerical analysis.

Prof Lubuma has received several awards and recognitions. These include the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences Sign of Honour in 2013 and the South African Mathematical Society Award for Research Distinction in 2011, which are the highest conferrable research recognitions of these institutions. Prof Lubuma is a Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences and a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa. The University of Pretoria consistently recognised Prof Lubuma as an Exceptional Academic Achiever from 2007 until his retirement in 2019.