Where Africa's scientists can see single atoms: Gqeberha's microscopy centre turns 15

Gqeberha — There is one place on the African continent where scientists can physically see and manipulate atoms, and it has just been re-equipped. South Africa's deputy minister of science, technology and innovation, Dr Nomalungelo Gina, unveiled two new scanning electron microscopes at Nelson Mandela University in Gqeberha on 14 October, as its Centre for High Resolution Transmission Electron Microscopy (CHRTEM) marked its 15th anniversary.

What the centre is

• CHRTEM, on the university's Ocean Sciences Campus, opened in 2011 with R90 million from the Department of Science, Technology and Innovation and the National Research Foundation. The higher education department added R30 million for its building.
• It remains the only facility in Africa with a double aberration-corrected transmission electron microscope.
• In 15 years it has logged more than 40,000 microscope hours, trained about 1,000 students and carried out over 700 research projects. Industry partners including Sasol, Element Six and Pebble Bed Modular Reactor have co-invested in it with government over the years.

What changes now

The centre's director, Professor Jaco Olivier, said the new microscopes replace instruments that are reaching the end of their factory support. They are more stable, faster and give stronger signals and sharper images, and they take the centre beyond materials such as steel and aluminium alloys into biomedical imaging and the bioeconomy.

Dr Gina said the anniversary was a commitment to keep South Africa able to "see, measure, understand and engineer matter" at the scale where future technologies are being made. She also welcomed news that Morocco is installing its own aberration-corrected microscopy equipment, saying the spread of advanced science infrastructure across the Global South opens new doors for African leadership.

Source: Department of Science, Technology and Innovation, 15 October 2026.