Nigerian born Inventors, their Inventions, Challenges and Opportunities

Nigerian born Inventors, their Inventions, Challenges and Opportunities

"Necessity is the mother of invention" is a popular adage used for describing the resultant effect of a difficult situation. Nigerian situation has been difficult for quite some years now and the positive outcomes of this rather unpalatable condition are the creativity, ingenuity and invention brought out by Nigerians to survive the condition. Ordinarily, Nigerians are gifted with above average level of ingenuity, hard work and perseverance, when added to the prevailing difficult situation the result is multitude of inventors. Thus, in the last 10 years, Nigeria has produced more than 100 inventors of all kind of devices with recognition from local to international level,

Invention is a creative process. It is certainly a vocation of first class mind, a product of imagination that allows one to see beyond what is known and norms. Seeing a new possibility, connection, or relationship can often spark up the process of invention. As written in Wikipedia "Inventive thinking frequently involves combining concepts or elements from different realms that would not normally be put together". Sometimes inventors disregard the boundaries between distinctly separate territories or fields. Several concepts may be considered when thinking about invention; re-envision, insight, exploration and improvement are few of such concepts bogging down the mind of inventor for successful invention. Generally, from the earliest stone tools of the Paleolithic era to the 21^st century with its latest digital advances, human inventions have shaped civilizations and transformed life on earth. The world of invention is dynamic; expectations and capabilities evolve with every step forward, and each new generation brings its own set of innovative thinkers. Nigeria, with an estimated population of 185 million people is blessed with innovative brains and creative minds among both the educated and non - formal educated people across the nation. Who are these inventors and what have they invented for us to recognize them?

Nigerian inventors have made impacts on all spheres of human endeavors and this column cannot list all the inventors and x-ray their inventions. However, few of the celebrated ones are catalogued in this article for inspiration to the young ones and analyzing the opportunities presented by each invention.  

Let me start with a young Nigerian inventor, a 24-year-old senior secondary school graduate, Emmanuel Okekunle from Jos. His full story is published in www.Naij.com. Mr. Okekunle  graduated from Cherubin and Seraphim College, Jos, Plateau State, in 2010. At the age of 5, he became interested in designing and constructing things and constructed a wheelbarrow to help him carry up to five litres of water. At 7, he started developing electric toy cars using motors, batteries and tomato tins. In JSS1, he designed a toy helicopter. In SS2, encouraged by a teacher who told his students their inventions could secure them a scholarship, he constructed a rechargeable lamp, fan, emergency alarm, electric waste bin that converts waste to ashes, and an aquarium, among other things. He sees his ability to design things as a natural talent. At first, he says, his parents did not appreciate what he was doing, as he would bring all kinds of ‘useful’ garbage home. However, when they saw their son’s achievements, they began to encourage and support him. NTA, Jos, gave publicity to the inventions made by Okekunle through the national network. Nigerian Society of Engineers, Jos branch, at one time invited him to inspect his works. However, not much was achieved as these inventions bore no "engineering design". Okekunle was not discouraged by engineers' assessment, he participated in NTA science exhibition. He worked on a methane digester and was able to use it to produce bio-gas. He represented Plateau State in Abuja at a science and technology exhibition with his apparatus.

The next Nigerian inventor is Saheed Adepoju,  the Co-founder of Encipher Limited, a Nigerian-based technology company that introduced the first android-powered tablet into Nigeria. The INYE-1 was unveiled in April 2010. It is a 7-inch resistive screen tablet, which runs android 2.1 and allows users to connect to the internet using its inbuilt Wi-Fi card and to use an external 3G modem from GSM networks. It offers about 3 hours of battery life and allows HDMI output to HDMI capable devices. He also invented INYE-2, unveiled, a year after the launching of INYE-1. INYE-2 is an 8-inch capacitive screen tablet. It runs Android 2.2 and allows users to connect to the internet using its inbuilt Wi-Fi card as well as its inbuilt SIM. It offers about 8 hours of battery life and allows users to connect to other USB devices

The third in the series is Seyi Oyesola, a trained medical doctor who invented CompactOR, popularly known as “Hospital in a Box”, a solar-powered life-saving operating room which can be transported to remote areas of Africa and set up within minutes. It is a portable medical system that contains anesthetic and surgical equipment. One major advantage of this invention is that the operating suite is light enough to be dropped into inaccessible zones by helicopter and it can be powered by solar panels. Dr. Seyi is a Nigerian trained doctor and a Worldwide acknowledged inventor. He received his basic science and medical education at the University of Lagos, Nigeria. He undergone a specialist training in Anesthesia and Critical Care in the United Kingdom and United States.

The next inventor is Col. Oviemo Ovadje (Rtd), he is a Nigerian medical Doctor who is credited with the invention of the Emergency Auto Transfusion System (EAT-SET), which is an effective, low-cost and affordable blood auto-transfusion mechanism that saves patients especially in developing countries. By 2013, He had patented the invention in nine countries. Oviemo was born in Nigeria and hails from Delta State. He began working on the invention in 1989 with $120 dollars. In 1995, he was declared best African scientist and founded EATSET Industries, in April 2001. The United Nation Development Program (UNDP) and the government of Nigeria funded the EAT-SET Project, with the World Health Organization (WHO) acting as the executing agency and providing assistance in the coordination of the project. Col Ovadje had received many international awards including:

*.OAU-WIPO Best African Scientist Gold Medal, Geneva Switzerland (1995);

*.Winner Promex Medal Geneva, Switzerland (1998);

*.First African Winner World Health Organisation Sasakawa Gold Medal, Geneva, Switzerland, (2000);

*.Winner ARCO Gold Medal, The Dorchester, UK, (2001);

*.Winner Army Council Medal, Nigeria Army, Army Head Quarters, Abuja, Nigeria.

Another inventor is Professor Kunle Olukotun. He is well known for leading the Stanford Hydra research project, which developed one of the first chip multiprocessors with support for thread-level speculation (TLS). Kunle is a Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Stanford University. He is a PhD graduate of Computer Engineering from The University of Michigan. He is the founder of Afara Websystems (later acquired by Sun Microsystems), a company that builds servers surrounding a custom high-throughput CPU architecture and develops IP traffic management systems for high-throughput, low power server systems with chip multiprocessor technology. Prof. Kunle, a hardworking Nigerian is no doubt an international inventor of high refute.

The next inventor is Mohammed Bah Abbah who invented an indigenous technology very useful for rural areas. He invented the “pot-in-pot refrigerator” or “zeer”, a refrigerating device that does not use electricity, It is most suitable for people in rural areas, who want have cold water during hot season. He won a Rolex Award for Enterprise, an award that provided $75,000 which Mohammed used to produce and distribute his inventions in 11 northern states in Nigeria. The pot-in-pot refrigerator was developed by Mohammed by combining the knowledge he had gained from his grandmother’s craft of traditional pottery with simple laws of physics. He followed up on the idea by placing food in a small pot, which is then placed in a larger pot. The space between the two is filled with moist sand and a wet cloth cover is used to cover the whole set up. As the water in the moist sand evaporates through the larger pot, it carries heat away from the inner core of the whole set up. It follows a simple engineering principle of cooling by evaporating. This simple but very useful invention was popularized by the inventor himself. He set up of a local production facilities to provide the pot-in-pot at the cost of $2 (N700) for the smaller pot-in-pot refrigerator and $4 (N1,300) for the bigger pot. The invention allows perishable food to extend their shelf lives. For instance, meat can be stored in it for up to two weeks instead of a few hours in an open tray. (To be Continued)