Prof. Mmantsae Diale is the South African Research Chair (SARCHI) in clean and green energy, with main research interests in exploring physical and chemical means to control the electronic and optical properties of materials, consequently, producing devices. She has a keen interest in solar energy conversion with a desire to see a life off-grid with photovoltaics (PV) and storage systems like hydrogen. Her research in PV systems involve the work on hybrid organic/inorganic materials for solar cell applications. MD has been awarded a National Science and Technology Forum (NSTF) prize in 2018 for capacity building in STEM, earned a PhD degree from the University of Pretoria, where she is a full professor of physics; with over 140 publications, some multiple invited and a few keynotes speaker in physics and materials science conferences, presenting scientific results.
She has been involved in business, as an adviser to just energy transition (JET) and energy efficiency, presenting an opinion on the effects of energy technologies on sustainable environment and livelihood, and is the developer and presenter of Solar Energy and Green Hydrogen Courses to both science, business and engineering. MD is an active member of materials research society (MRS), having served as member of academic affairs, symposium organizer, one of the five meeting chairs of 2024 and influencing the support for early career researchers. She has collaborated with many researchers worldwide and is very keen on developing research and researchers in Africa, using her laboratory space and resources to allow others to benefit. Prof Diale is an active member of South African Institute of Physics, member of council from 2010 -2017 and founder and chair of women in physics in South Africa (WiPiSA), also served the IUPAP-C13 commission for the past 9 years, and former secretary of the commission. Prof Diale is on a mission to launch women in physics in African countries, the project started in 2008; but stalled due to issues related to funding. She has graduated 30 MSc students, and 26 PhD physicists, most of whom are working in data science, engineering, business, banks and research.