March 2020

Research that changes lives!

Welcome to 2020's second edition of the North-West University's newsletter, Research@NWU. The aim of the newsletter is to showcase research projects, researchers and related events. This newsletter is one of seven, distributed to academic staff and researchers during the year.

NWU on the edge of enhanced understanding of the human brain

Despite some remarkable advances in the history of mankind, the functionality of the human brain remains a mystery. Wouldn't the possibility to look into the human brain with high precision in a much easier way just be amazing? This has just been made possible at the NWU's Centre for Health and Human Performance (CHHP).

SADiLaR leads in digitising 11 national languages

Digitising South Africa's 11 official languages could go a long way towards creating a truly multilingual society. Various projects are currently in progress at the South African Centre for Digital Language Resources (SADiLaR), located at the NWU, to create digital resources for the country's official languages.

How SA could minimise heart disease deaths

Globally, heart disease remains the leading cause of death among middle-aged adults, accounting for 40% of all deaths. An alarming 80% of these deaths occur in low and middle-income countries such as South Africa. This is one of the findings from the multinational Prospective Urban and Rural Epidemiology (PURE) study.

The Cave: a digital safe haven for stressed social workers

Generally social work is considered a stressful occupation due to the emotional demands on practitioners. One group of social workers that is particularly at risk for negative outcomes are those employed within the child protection practice setting, tasked with the statutory duty to protect children.

NWU TRADE and WTO continue collaboration under WTO Chairs Programme

In recognition of the excellent work done by Prof Wilma Viviers in the NWU's TRADE research entity under the World Trade Organization (WTO) Chairs Programme over the past few years, the WTO has agreed that the Chair will continue to be hosted by the NWU after its initial four-year run, with Prof Viviers remaining the Chair holder. The work of the WTO Chair is carried out in the TRADE research focus area, which forms part of the NWU's Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences.

Read more about the programme

Watch Prof Viviers commenting on the continuation of the WTO Chairs Programme at the NWU.

Get to know the NWU's research chairs

The NWU has a number of dedicated and knowledgeable research chairs that help steer the university into realising its ideal of producing research and innovation with a notable international impact. In this edition we meet Prof Jako Olivier, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization Chair on Multimodal Learning and Open Educational Resources.

watch the video

Please share your comments and input by sending an email to the newsletter editor, willie.duplessis@nwu.ac.za