University of the Witwatersrand

Insights into professional development for junior secondary mathematics teachers viewed as out-of-field – a South African case

Abstract Out-of-field (OOF) mathematics teaching is complex and context-dependent, particularly where formal qualifications do not adequately reflect teachers’ preparedness. Drawing on a longitudinal professional development (PD) programme for junior secondary mathematics teacher...

Diagnosing excess sampling variance: empirical validation and practical frameworks beyond Gy's Fundamental Sampling Error

Abstract Gy's Fundamental Sampling Error (FSE) formula establishes a theoretical lower bound on the variance of sampling particulate materials, conditional on independent particle selection and a spatially representative sampling protocol; a companion paper (Minnitt, 2026) develo...

The impact of the COVID-19 national lockdown on acute coronary syndromes related hospitalization in Johannesburg, South Africa

Evidence from low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) on how COVID-19 lockdown measures affected acute coronary syndrome (ACS) care is limited. We assessed the impact of South Africa’s national lockdown on ACS hospitalisations and clinical severity at presentation at a large ter...

Co-development of a Mental Health Data Discovery Platform and Harmonisation of Mental Health Measures for Young People in South Africa (PAMHoYA) - A research protocol

Africa’s mental health information landscape is widely recognised as fragmented, limiting planning, budgeting, and service delivery. In South Africa, this fragmentation is reflected in the collection of depression and anxiety data across multiple institutions and studies, using d...

Interpreting Seasonal Forecast Visualizations: Differences in Mental Models Between Experts and Users

Weather and climate forecasting tools are becoming indispensable in helping individuals and communities prepare and cope with future conditions. However, despite considerable improvements in the physics behind forecasting in recent decades, forecasting still comes with inherent u...

Annual and Seasonal Rainfall Variability in Mozambique During the Nineteenth Century

ABSTRACT Understanding long‐term rainfall variability is critical for assessing climate risk in drought‐prone regions of southern Africa, yet instrumental records for much of the subcontinent are short and spatially sparse. Here, we present the first annually and seasonally resol...

Consistent truncations from duality symmetries and desingularization of orbifold uplifts

A bstract This paper is an extension of the results presented in [1]. We study G S -invariant subsectors of maximal gauged supergravities and show that such models can provide consistent truncations even when G S is not a symmetry of the original supergravity. We show that this c...

Mortality differentials between self-settled refugees and South Africans in rural South Africa: insights from the Agincourt HDSS, 1994–2018

Low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) host most of the world’s refugees but often have limited mortality information systems. Consequently, evidence on the long-term mortality trajectories of self-settled refugees and the contribution of socioeconomic disadvantage to mortality...

Geospatial analysis of the association of cardiometabolic diseases and incident Lewy body dementia in the Medicare population

Abstract INTRODUCTION: Research on the potential role of cardiometabolic diseases (CMDs) as risk factors for Lewy body dementia (LBD) is limited, and findings from existing studies remain inconclusive. We investigated the geospatial patterns of CMDs and the association with LBD a...

Plurality in transformative change: Three co‐created pathways toward nature‐positive Europe(s)

1.The accelerating decline of biodiversity necessitates transformative change to protect nature and society, requiring innovative actions and governance strategies. This paper focuses on developing diverse transformative pathways for biodiversity in Europe and advancing methodolo...

Remote engineering of particle-like topologies to visualise entanglement dynamics

Abstract Skyrmions are a particle-like topology with a quantized skyrmion number, realized across condensed matter and photonic platforms alike. In quantum photonics, they constitute an emerging resource, promising robust quantum information encoding, so far realized as single-ph...

ECNN-MmIC: an Enhanced Convolutional Neural Network model with hybrid optimization strategy techniques for diabetes and cardiovascular disease comorbidity

The increasing prevalence and clinical interrelationship of diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular disease (CVD) present substantial challenges to healthcare systems, creating a need for efficient and robust diagnostic approaches to support early intervention and continuous patient...

Population genomics, resistome and plasmidome of invasive Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates in adults hospitalised in Johannesburg, South Africa

Abstract Klebsiella pneumoniae (KPn) is a leading cause of healthcare-associated infections in adults in low- and middle-income countries. We conducted laboratory-based surveillance between 2023 and 2024 in Johannesburg, South Africa, and analysed 508 KPn whole genomes isolated f...

Mean regression for (0, 1) responses via beta scale mixtures

Abstract To achieve greater flexibility for modelling heavy-tailed responses on the unit interval, a beta scale mixture (BSM) regression model is proposed. The conditional response is assigned a mean-parameterised beta distribution whose variability parameter is scaled by a mixin...

Immune control of HIV viraemia in early paediatric infection is associated with induction of HIV-specific CD8+ T-cell activity following multiple treatment interruptions

BACKGROUND: Virus-specific CD8+ T-cells play an important part in HIV cure/remission in adults, yet their role in paediatric immune control is limited by tolerogenic early-life immunity. Very-early ART initiation, while effective in restricting viral reservoir size, also prevents...

Computational strategies to address therapeutic resistance in estrogen receptor‐positive breast cancer: A narrative review of molecular docking, molecular dynamics simulations, and emerging therapeutic targets

Abstract Background Estrogen receptor‐positive (ER+) breast cancer represents the most common molecular subtype of breast cancer and remains highly responsive to endocrine therapy. However, therapeutic efficacy is frequently compromised by acquired or intrinsic endocrine resistan...

Contesting Norms and Challenging Order: Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act 2023 and the Geopolitics of LGBTIQ+ Human Rights

Abstract Uganda’s adoption of the Anti-Homosexuality Act in 2023 reveals significant contestation among domestic and external actors regarding LGBTIQ+ human rights norms. This article argues that opposition to LGBTIQ+ rights has become central to contemporary challenges to the li...

A spatio-temporal modelling of climate variability on respiratory disease morbidity in Kampala city, Uganda

Abstract Background : Climate change poses serious public health risks, particularly in rapidly growing urban areas. Similarly, the interaction between month and year was not statistically significant (edf = 0.75, p = 0.296), indicating a relatively stable seasonal pattern over t...

Harms associated with engaging with AI for mental health support: A scoping review protocol

Background Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly used for mental health support, through both purpose-built products and general-purpose large language models (LLMs), at a pace far greater than evidence of their efficacy or safety. There is no consensus taxonomy of the pot...

MicroRNA Control of Hepatocyte–Stromal Crosstalk in the Early Premalignant Microenvironment of HBV-Associated HCC

Chronic hepatitis B virus (CHB) infection remains a major cause of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), yet the premalignant microenvironment that links to HBV-associated HCC (HBV-HCC) is still poorly defined. This review synthesizes evidence that HBV-infected hepatocytes function as...