Dr Opio obtained her M.Sc. in 1979 from the University of Nairobi (Kenya) and PhD in 1992 from Sokoine University of Agriculture, Morogoro (Tanzania). She then went to Uganda and has been working at the Namulonge Research Institute of Uganda.  Her research has involved the study of beans, which has culminated in the release of a number of technologies. She has developed strategies for the containment of two serious diseases (coffee wilt and banana bacterial wilt) and has made advances in developing control strategy to the common bacterial blight (CBB) diseases of beans, and also on bacterial wilt of solanaceous crops caused by Ralstonia solanacearum. She has devised control measures for bean root rot disease and has also developed a disease management strategy. She has been the Director of Research of Namulonge Agricultural and Animal Production Research Institute, Vice-President of the Uganda National Academy of Sciences, member of the Council of Science and Technology, Programme Leader of Beans and Principal Research Officer. She is member of the Indian Phytopathological Society, the Agricultural Technical Committee, African Crop Science Society and several other professional societies; she has 60 publications (2005)