Morgan Madhuku

Morgan Madhuku is a Research Scientist at iThemba LABS (Gauteng), mainly responsible for the new microprobe instrument on the 6 MV Tandem accelerator. When Morgan joined iThemba LABS (Gauteng), the Tandem accelerator and microprobe, which were in a state of disrepair, were undergoing refurbishment. He was, therefore, involved in the setting up, trouble shooting, calibration, and commissioning of the new microprobe facility. Morgan was the acting Head of iThemba LABS (Gauteng) from 01 January – 31 May 2009. Morgan has been working in accelerator-based research for about a decade and during his PhD studies he participated in Muon Spin Rotation, Relaxation and Resonance (μSR) experiments as part of an international collaboration between the Rutherford Appleton laboratory’s ISIS Muon facility and the University of the Witwatersrand (ISIS-Wits) collaboration in Muon Science, where he played an active role writing research proposals, preparing for the experiments and, basically, coordinating the two research teams. Morgan’s primary research interests include ion beam-induced synthesis, modification, and analysis of materials and hydrogen studies in wide bandgap materials by means of μSR techniques. Prior to Joining iThemba LABS, Morgan was a Graduate Teacher in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, for about five years, where he taught High School Physical Science, Mathematics and General Science. He was a tutor/demonstrator in the School of Physics from 2004 – 2007 during his PhD studies at the University of the Witwatersrand. Morgan served as external examiner for the Honours Courses in the department of Physics at the University of Venda from 2009 - 2011. He is currently supervising and/or co-supervising 5 PhD and 2 MSc students. Morgan’s work has been presented at national and international conferences and has also been published in peer-reviewed international journals. Two posters he prepared won prizes at the 2008 μSR international conference in Japan and at the 2015 international conference of the African Materials Research Society (Africa-MRS 2015) in Ghana. In 2013 he was awarded a TWAS postdoctoral fellowship and spent six months at the National Centre for Physics (NCP) in Islamabad, Pakistan, working on ion beam analysis of group III-nitride materials. The NCP-TWAS postdoctoral fellowship provided the much needed boost to his research capabilities in ion beam analysis of materials and he is continuing this work at iThemba LABS (Gauteng). Morgan obtained his undergraduate degree in Applied Physics from the National University of Science & Technology (NUST), Bulawayo, in 1998; a Master of Science in Physics from the University of Fort Hare in 2003; and a PhD in Experimental Condensed Matter Physics from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in 2008.