STARSTEM Coordinator Prof Martin Leahy, TOMI-NUI Galway was an invited speaker at the AFSIN Workshop at the University of the Cape Coast in Ghana. Martin delivered 16 talks in total to a group of 42 PhD students and 8 professors hailing from Ghana, Senegal, Togo, Mali, Cote d’Ivoire, Kenya, Cameroon, Sri Lanka, Sweden and Burkina Faso.

One of the sixteen talks that Martin facilitated was a dedicated STARSTEM lecture on 23 July 2019.

The African Spectral Imaging Network (AFSIN) is a collaboration between physicists in eight African countries (Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Senegal and Togo) and one Asian country (Sri Lanka). The goal of the network is to contribute to the benefit of the laboratories in the member countries, to the development of research activities of international standard in the fields of applied spectroscopy and spectral imaging. The strategy to achieve the overall goals is to organize annual workshops for training students and young scientists in the areas of optical spectral and imaging techniques applied to medicine, agriculture and the environment. The network also builds instruments for realistic diagnostic tools related to tropical diseases such as malaria, to monitor pollution affecting agriculture and environment, and to use optical diagnostics for quality control and improved crop yield.