Crystallography is an emerging science in Ghana, anchored by a growing base of advanced analytical instrumentation at the country’s leading universities and reinforced by international training initiatives held on Ghanaian soil.
InfrastructureResearch facilities
Two universities form the backbone of crystallography and materials characterisation capacity in Ghana, hosting diffraction, spectroscopy and microscopy instrumentation used across the physical and chemical sciences.
University of Ghana
School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Legon, Accra
The University of Ghana hosts a PANalytical Empyrean X-ray diffractometer alongside other X-ray diffraction generators, a 500 MHz Bruker nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer, scanning electron microscopes, ICP-MS, UV-Vis spectroscopy, a cyclic voltammeter, and a Shimadzu RF-6000 spectrofluorometer.
Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST)
Kumasi
KNUST hosts a 500 MHz Bruker nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer, supporting structural and analytical research in the region.
TrainingIUCr OpenLab events
Ghana has hosted two International Union of Crystallography (IUCr) OpenLab events, bringing hands-on crystallographic training and equipment expertise to the University of Ghana.
- 2014
IUCr OpenLab at the University of Ghana, 9-12 June 2014, held as part of the International Year of Crystallography.
- 2019
IUCr-Bruker OpenLab at the University of Ghana, 28 January – 2 February 2019.
ScholarshipPublications and presentations
The development of crystallography in Ghana has been documented and championed by Prof Robert Kingsford-Adaboh.
Crystallography – as an emerging science: has Ghana a place?
A published account by Prof Robert Kingsford-Adaboh examining the standing of crystallography as an emerging science in Ghana, appearing in the journals of the International Union of Crystallography (2017).
Review of Crystallography in Ghana
A plenary talk by Prof Robert Kingsford-Adaboh, delivered at the joint African Light Source Conference and Pan-African Conference on Crystallography in January 2019.
