From premature-born child to international engineer: Cameroon welcomes home acclaimed nuclear engineer, Arsène Biwole

By Tata Mbunwe

Cameroon’s high-achieving physicists and nuclear engineer, Arsène Biwole, will be spending over one month in the country where he is expected to contribute in reviving Cameroon’s energy sector.

After a successful career abroad where he has worked with experienced scientists from the National Space Authority, NASA, Biwole was invited into the country by Youth Affairs Minister, Monouna Fotso, where he will be participating in a project to help group diaspora youths under government’s Youth Conekt initiative.

The genius of physics collaborates with NASA on several projects, in particular that of nuclear fusion. His work has made it possible in particular to calculate the self-generated currents in nuclear plasmas for energy purposes.
“He dreamed and was able to achieve his goals,” exclaimed Mounouna Foutsou during a hearing he granted Friday, January 8, 2021 to the one he presents as a model of success for other young Cameroonians.
“I would like to spark the dream, to break down the various barriers which are psychological that these young people have in the trades which concern physics,” Minister Fotso further said.

Arsène Tema Biwole will stay in Cameroon from January 4 to February 13, 2021 during which he is expected to share his experiences at an initiative Coordinated by MINJEC through the Program for the return and integration of young people from the diaspora (Pari-Jedi).

According to Biwole, nuclear fusion is the solution to the energy crisis facing the world and Cameroon.

“The problems that we encounter in this sector will be more serious with the passage of time because the Cameroonian population will grow. We are talking about 50 million Cameroonians by 2050 and by the end of the century we will be around 80 million Cameroonians. In addition, we will need to industrialize massively. So in any case, we will have a need for energy which will be concrete and which is even already imminent,” said the researcher.

Approaching the problem, he says, “My contribution will be to understand what are the advances, what are we succeeding to doing at the local level, and what could be integrated into the energy mix of Cameroon so that energy production is in phase with the development of the country. This is a point that is very important because, for the country to develop and industrialize, there absolutely must be the source of energy that allows it to be done.”

Arsène Biwole: From a helpless Cameroonian child to an astounding physicist

Before rubbing shoulders with the luminaries of the world of physics, the Cameroonian expert had a difficult childhood. Arsène Stéphane Tema Biwole was born on June 15, 1992 in Bafoussam in western Cameroon. Born prematurely, neither the doctors, nor even his parents, did believe he could survive, so Biwola suffered difficult circumstances since his first day on planet earth.

However, this did not prevent him from following primary studies at a public school in Bafoussam and later secondary studies at the Bilingual High School in his hometown where he obtained the Baccalaureate C with distinction.

After spending two years at the University of Dschang, the child prodigy set out to conquer the world with a scholarship that took him to the University of Turin in Italy where he studied nuclear sciences.
His talent and the results of his research propelled him in 2017 to pursue “General Atomics”.

Alongside being into nuclear engineering research, physicist currently teaches physics at the Federal Polytechnic School of Lausanne in Switzerland.

Speaking to his compatriots in Cameroon, Arsène Tema said pupils a d students of final-year classes should approach this school year with a different perspective from scientific subjects and physics.

His stay in Cameroonian will lead him to the West and Far North regions, where he will teach physics to students of universities and grandes écoles. The winner of the “Excellence Jeunesse 2020” distinction, awarded by MINJEC, also crowned with his position as ambassador of the “Youth connekt Cameroon” project will also be awarded this prize by the authorities on the occasion of the activities marking the celebration of the youth.