Dr Barnabas Danborno
Associate Professor of Anatomy, Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, Nigeria
"A good public understanding of science is the major ingredient for national development."
Dr Barnabas Danborno received his B.Sc. in Anatomy in 1992 from the University of Maiduguri, an M.Sc. and PhD from Ahmadu Bello University in 2002 and 2008 respectively. He joined the services of the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria in 1994. After his PhD he got a Wenner-Gren Short-term fellowship to undergo training in Anthropological Genetics in the Laboratory of Biological Anthropology, Department of Anthropology, at the University of Kansas, United States.
Dr. Danborno has taught and coordinated many courses to graduate students in the area of Anatomy, Cell Biology, Genetics, Biological Anthropology and Bio-informatics. During his career, Dr Danborno has supervised 35 Master of Science (MSc) dissertations and 10 PhD theses largely in biological anthropology, but also in cell biology and molecular genetics.
Dr Danborno has held several positions. He was Examination Officer and B.Sc. Anatomy Program Coordinator, Postgraduate Coordinator, and Head of Department (2009-2013). He served as the Secretary-General of the Anatomical Society of Nigeria (SN) from 2008-2010 and presently the Vice President, Nigerian Society of Human Genetics (NiSHG). In 2012, he was also awarded the fellowship to attend the Summer Program in Neuroscience Ethics and Survival (SPINES) course at the Marine Biological Laboratory, Wood Holes, United States. In 2013 Dr Danborno received a fellowship from TReND to attend the first IBRO ARC School of Insect Neuroscience and Neurogenetics held at Kampala International University, Ishaka, Bushenyi, Uganda. During the Summer of 2015, he visited the laboratory of Dr Jennifer Gleason at the Department of Evolutionary Biology and Ecology, at the University of Kansas, to receive additional training in fruit fly biology.
In 2019, Dr Danborno was also selected to attend the First Genome Editing Course organized by Foundation for the National Institute Health, held in International Center for Insect Ecology and Physiology, Nairobi Kenya. Dr Danborno and his wife Dr Angela Danborno founded the non-for-profit organization STEM4GirlsNigeria in 2017 with the sole aim of encouraging girls and young women into pursuing studies and careers in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). Since its inception STEM4GirlsNigeria has conducted STEM outreaches events in Bingham University in 2017, Redemption College, Zaria in 2018 and the third in Triton International School, Masaka-Kuchikau, Karu, Nasarawa State. This last outreach was partly sponsored by TReND in Africa and STEM4GrilsNigeria recently won the 2020 IBRO Dana Brain Awareness grant for a brain awareness project.
Dr Danborno has been a former and current member of many scientific societies including the American Association for Anatomy, American Association of Physical Anthropologists, Society for Experimental and Clinical Anatomists of Nigeria and the Nigerian Society of Human Genetics. Currently, Dr Danborno and his undergraduate and graduate students have been studying the biology of the Nigerian population from the north to the south using anthropological and genetic approaches. He has attended many local and international conferences and workshops and has published over 90 scientific articles and is a reviewer to some biomedical journals.