Professor Fourie Joubert

Professor Fourie Joubert grew up in Pretoria and received all his degrees from the University of Pretoria (UP). He was offered an academic position towards the end of his PhD and has been doing research at UP for 30 years; this includes his postgraduate projects. “I have not moved out of Pretoria, for employment or for personal reasons,” he says. “I have always respected the University of Pretoria.”

Prof Joubert says his research contributes to the betterment of the world because bioinformatics, and especially genomics, is relevant to every living organism. He is particularly interested in human health from a genomic perspective, and his own research programme focuses on breast cancer.

Within his academic discipline, his research group has worked on novel genomic variants that influence breast cancer susceptibility among South African patients. He collaborates widely with various groups at UP – including other faculties and institutes – that work on viruses, bacteria, fungi, insects, nematodes, plants, animals and humans. Prof Joubert particularly enjoys his collaborations with Prof Michael Pepper, Director of UP’s Institute for Cellular and Molecular Medicine, on subjects such as cystic fibrosis, pharmacogenomics, COVID-19 and neonatal encephalopathy with suspected hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy.

His research group’s most recent highlight was having a paper published in Scientific Reports in February 2022 (Eygelaar, Jansen van Rensburg and Joubert). It describes novel breast cancer susceptibility variants among South African women.

Looking back on his journey as a researcher, he says there has been many people who have inspired his research effort and specifically mentions Dr. Francis Collins, former Director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, (USA), at the time at the National Institutes of Health who led the public Human Genome sequencing project. He mentions that Dr. Collins remains a great advocate of Christianity, in the face of much adversity, which has inspired him in a personal regard.

“As a side line, I have also been following the work on neanderthal genomes and other ancient genome projects and was happy to see Svante Pääbo win this year’s Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his neanderthal genome work”.

As for academic role models, he mentions his wife, Prof Annie Joubert, who is the Head of UP’s Department of Physiology. “She has the best work ethic and the most caring nature for her colleagues that I have ever seen.”

Prof Joubert hopes to make a real difference in people’s lives through his research, including his students and the public. His research matters, he says, because African genomes have been severely neglected in the genomics era, particularly in terms of health. Many of the projects he is involved in attempt to remedy this situation.

The field of bioinformatics and genomics is crucial to much of the biological science research that is being done. Learners and undergraduates who are interested in the field should take note that it is highly multidisciplinary and never gets boring, he says. “There is a place for everyone in the field.”

His hobbies and interests include riding his Harley Davidson motorcycles with his son Louis and wife Annie, and importantly Luke and Leia, his Golden Retrievers.


Research by Professor Fourie Joubert

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    Researchers at the University of Pretoria (UP) are making today matter by battling aggressive breast cancer through identifying genes that make African women more susceptible to certain forms of breast cancer. However, this is no easy task as very little genomic information is known about African populations. This is just one of UP's research projects that aim to ensure that there is a clear...

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