Profile: Dr. Belete Adefris Legesse is Head of Medicinal Chemistry at CDT-Africa. He is Co-investigator for development of medicinal plants-based drugs for skin neglected tropical disease (Skin NTDs) at CDT-Africa. He is lead researcher for bench scale synthesis of active pharmaceutical ingredients (API’s). He serves as NIHR Global Health Research (GHR) Training Programme Selection Committee Academy Member. 

Areas of Expertise: Drug discovery and development; Synthetic organic chemistry for green and medicinal chemistry applications; Local production of medicines through bench scale synthesis of active pharmaceutical ingredients; Nanotechnology for point of care diagnostic kit development.

Academic Background: BSc in Applied Chemistry from Hawassa (Debub) University, Hawassa, Ethiopia; MSc in Organic Chemistry from Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; PhD in Chemical Engineering, Northeastern University, Boston, USA

 Current position: Dr. Belete is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at CDT-Africa, Addis Ababa University and Brighton & Sussex Medical School (BSMS).  He is Head of Medicinal Chemistry at CDT-Africa. 

Publications: Dr. Belete’s publications list can be found here. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1402-9221