NRF Youth Month 2025: Enele Twala

The NRF supports the growth of the next generation of researchers and scholars to sustain South Africa’s knowledge enterprise. June is Youth Month, and this year the NRF is celebrating the youth who are shaping tomorrow through research today. We thank all participants for sharing their stories with us.

Ms Enele Twala is a PhD student in Palaeontology at the Evolutionary Studies Institute (ESI), University of the Witwatersrand. She received funding from the NRF for her Master’s and PhD studies.

How did your journey start?

If you told me in 2015 that I would be a scientist in 2025, I wouldn’t have believed you.

Growing up, I knew one thing: I loved biology, particularly anatomy. Therefore, with the limited career options I knew about, I assumed that this meant I should become a medical doctor. Fast forward to the end of matric, I passed with six distinctions and I was convinced that I was going to get into a medical programme. Instead, I was not accepted anywhere I had applied to, and at that moment, I felt that my dreams had been shattered.

Luckily, I come from a family that is extremely supportive, and because of the passion for science that they knew I had, they encouraged me to pursue a science degree instead. This led me to a BSc in Biological Science, followed by an Honours in Palaeontology at Wits.

I gained more than just the knowledge and skills throughout my undergraduate degree. The biggest thing I took from it was the importance of research, particularly good research, in shaping the world as we know it and shaping how we understand and perceive the world. And it was then that I realised that my destiny lay in being a scientist.

How has your affiliation with the NRF impacted your studies/career?

I received funding from the NRF for both my MSc degree and my current PhD research. Receiving an NRF scholarship through the GENUS: DSTI-NRF Centre of Excellence in Palaeosciences has opened doors that have changed my life for the better.

Along with my love of science, I am also extremely passionate about science communication. My favourite quote is “science is not done until it is communicated,” and this has become a philosophy that I live by. Therefore, in 2024, I was provided with the opportunity to participate in the Wits Centre of Excellence (CoE) FameLab heat. FameLab SA, hosted by NRF-SAASTA and Jive Media, is a competition where participants share their science in 3 minutes. I ended up winning this heat and received the opportunity to represent Wits as a semi-finalist at the national FameLab SA heat.

FameLab opened so many doors for me. Since then, I have been invited to appear on TV shows such as Playroom 2.0 where I got to talk about being a woman in science. I have been invited to be a guest host for a BBC documentary, which will be released early in 2026.

More recently, I was invited to be a guest speaker at the Nature, Environment Wildlife Filmakers (NEWF) conference, where I was given the opportunity to speak about what I do during a panel discussion called Match Made in Science. The audience voted me the best scientist, and I won the opportunity to attend the World Congress of Science conference this December.

What is your research focus/area of expertise?

On paper, I am considered a palaeontologist. However, I am also affectionately known as Usisi wamathambo (the girl who specialises in bones) by those close to me. I consider myself a biologist with a passion for time travel, using extant taxa to uncover key macroevolutionary and palaeobiological insights.

My MSc focused on studying the hearing of owls to see what it could tell us about the hearing dinosaurs, particularly South African dinosaurs. My current PhD research focuses on using synchrotron scanning to uncover the growth strategies of early branching reptiles that led to the diverse growth strategies we observe in modern reptiles, including birds, snakes and lizards.

How is your research helping to shape a better future?

South African palaeontology is known mostly as the Cradle of Humankind. However, South Africa can be considered the Cradle of Life as we know it, as we hold the most incredible fossils. From the origins of oxygen-breathing lifeforms to marine life and mammals, and the biggest dinosaur fossils located in the smallest villages of the Eastern Cape.

Therefore, by highlighting South African fossils in my research, I not only get to put it on the global map as a forefront of palaeontology, but I also get to put it on local maps, as many South Africans are unaware of our rich fossil treasures.  

Being a young researcher often means juggling numerous responsibilities and expectations. How do you stay motivated and/or balanced?

I have hobbies! This is extremely important, as I have noticed that taking time off from my research to do other things that I enjoy often results in not losing interest in my research. And it invigorates me. Also, I do things every day that contribute to my overall well-being: exercising and getting enough sleep are non-negotiable.

What has been your proudest achievement to date?

This is actually a very difficult question. But I would have to say that my proudest achievement to date is aiding in making science understandable and accessible to everyone.

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