Witsie innovator takes first place at global science summit
- Wits Alumni Relations
Tamlyn Naidu acknowledged for her novel way of tackling acid mine drainage.
Wits alumna Tamlyn Sasha Naidu (BSc 2014, BSc Eng 2016) took first prize in the 2022 Falling Walls Lab world finals held on 7 November 2022.
Naidu, a postdoctoral research fellow at Wits, received the prestigious Breakthrough Winner award in the Emerging Talents category for her presentation "Breaking the Wall of Acid Mine Drainage" held in Berlin, Germany.
The Falling Walls Lab is an international network and forum for young innovators in science, technology, medicine, and other fields. It includes top academic institutions from more than 60 countries and is a platform for creative thinkers to introduce their “breaking walls” ideas to the public. The reference is to the Berlin Wall, which fell in 1989 after separating East and West Berlin for nearly 28 years.
A total of 80 winners from 54 countries pitched their breakthrough ideas, tackling such modern-day challenges as vaccine equity, global warming, and the tracking and removal of space debris. Candidates had only three minutes to pitch their ideas to judges and the audience.
Naidu’s project tackles mining related water pollution and land loss. In her talk she demonstrated how one small stream from an abandoned mine in South Africa produced millions of rands of damage to nearby farms, waterways and ecosystems. The problem is not limited to South Africa, but exists globally with multiple countries on each continent. “In 2015 the United Nations classified acid mine drainage as the second largest problem facing the Earth, second only to global warning,” she said.
She came up with a “cost-effective modular solution” using waste products from the refining and agricultural sectors, resulting in a nutrient rich sludge which can be used for farming. Naidu has smartly figured out how to use waste from different industries to create something useful.
Firstly, precious metals are recovered from the mine water using ion exchange technology. The second aspect involves adding a steel slag (waste from steel industry) to raise the pH to neutral and lower the metal content. Then a sugarcane bagasse (agricultural waste) is added as the substrate for the biological process. This removes the sulphate to restore the drainage water within agricultural limits and eventually to “almost drinking standards”.
“All the products have a value and it has been tested at a lab scale and pilot scale, with resounding success,” she said.
Dame Sarah Springman, Principal of St Hilda’s College, Oxford and Falling Walls Lab jury chair said: “It’s really great to listen to 80 young entrepreneurs from around the world, diverse in every which way, as they pitch, persuade, network and knock those walls down. I believe that it is a really important informal part of a young person’s education to be able to expose and present their ideas, within a relatively supportive growth environment, and on a more intimate stage than they will meet later in life.”
Naidu said that she was shocked by the win but hoped her solution would be implemented and raise awareness about acid mine drainage.
Another South African student, Emma Horn, a PhD candidate from the University of Cape Town, won second place with her research on a green bio-tile innovation.