Déborah Amani Faraja from Democratic Republic of Congo 🇨🇩. Déborah is a student at the University of Kinshasa (DRC). She defended her Master’s thesis in 2020 at the University of Grenoble (France). She is currently a PhD student, co-supervised by Christian Maire and Alain Musesa Landa. Her PhD is funded by IMU-CDC through its GRAID progam.
Copernic Boungouendji Lebouma from Gabon 🇬🇦🇨🇬. Copernic completed his Master’s thesis in 2024 at the Université des Sciences et Techniques de Masuku (USTM) in Franceville. He is now a PhD candidate at Marien Ngouabi University in Congo, co-supervised by Christian Maire and Basile Guy Richard Bossoto, with research focused on Galois theory, local fields, and related aspects of arithmetic geometry. Copernic was awarded a Master’s fellowship by the Simons Foundation through its Africa Mathematics Projects program (May 2013–April 2023), as part of the PREMA project in Gabon. In 2024, he was also awarded a Breakout Graduate Fellowship from the International Mathematical Union Committee for Developing Countries (IMU–CDC). Presentation, March 2025.
Pierre Ebayi Essanga from Gabon 🇬🇦. Pierre is a Gabonese student at the Université des Sciences et Techniques de Masuku (USTM) in Franceville, Gabon. He defended his Master’s thesis in 2024 and is currently pursuing a PhD under the co-supervision of Christian Maire and Mohamed Ali Ipopa. His research interests include the inverse Galois problem, Massey products in Galois cohomology, the Scholz–Reichardt theorem, and related topics in Galois theory.
Joseph Saha Fomekong from Cameroon 🇨🇲. Joseph is a Cameroonian mathematician and PhD student at Université Abdou Moumouni, Niger. He obtained his Master of Technology degree from the University of Bamenda, Cameroon, where he defended his Master’s thesis entitled “A Lenstra–Lenstra–Lovász Algorithm on Modules over Compositum of Cyclotomic and Quadratic Number Fields”, under the supervision of Tony Ezome and Tale Kalachi. He is currently pursuing his PhD under the supervision of Professor Fouotsa Emmanuel and Professor Morou Amidou. His doctoral research focuses on designing digital signature schemes via MPC-in-the-Head from new hard mathematical problems, with research interests in post-quantum cryptography, digital signatures, lattice-based cryptography, algebraic coding theory, and computational number theory.
Beni Blaug Nomiss IBARA from Congo 🇨🇬. Beni completed his Master’s degree in 2023 at Marien Ngouabi University in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo. He is currently a PhD candidate at Marien Ngouabi University under the supervision of Prof. Régis Fréguin Babindamana. His research focuses on coding theory, more specifically on the construction of error-correcting codes from algebraic surfaces. In 2026, Beni was awarded a fellowship through the Lie–Størmer CIMPA Programme to attend an advanced course on formal proof verification.
Aldo Spero Lokossa from Gabon 🇬🇦🇨🇬. Aldo completed his Master’s thesis in 2024 at Université des Sciences et Techniques de Masuku in Franceville in Gabon. He is now a PhD candidate at Marien Ngouabi University in Congo, co-supervised by Steffen Mueller (Groningen Unviersity) and Basile Guy Richard Bossoto, with research focused on arithmetic geometry. Aldo has been awarded with a master fellowship by the Simons Foundation through their program Africa Mathematics Projects May 2013 – April 2023 (via the PREMA Project in Gabon). He also has been awarded with a travel grant funded by the University of Groningen’s sub-Saharan Africa program. Presentation, March 2025.
Ephraim Poncho-Kotey from Ghana 🇬🇭. Ephraim is a PhD student at University of Ghana in Accra. He works on intersection theory on surfaces and applications. His PhD work is coadvised by Ralph Twum (Ghana) and Tony Ezome. Ephraim has benefited from several research stays in Gabon, for which he received financial support from CNRS through the program Dispositif de Soutien aux Collaborations avec l’Afrique subsaharienne (via the REDGATE Project in Gabon). His PhD is funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York in USA through its program Higher Education and Research in Africa (via the BANGA Project in Ghana). Presentation, March 2025.
Karim Sankara from Burkina Faso 🇧🇫. Karim is a PhD student at Université Nazi Boni in Burkina Faso. He works on the Galois inverse problem for the Hilbert p-Class Field tower with splitting condition. His work is coadvised by Idrissa Kaboré (Burkina Faso) and Christian Maire. Karim has benefited from several research stays in France, for which he received financial support from CNRS through the program Dispositif de Soutien aux Collaborations avec l’Afrique subsaharienne (via the REDGATE Project in Gabon) and FEMTO-ST Institute. His PhD is funded by IMU-CDC through its GRAID progam. His PhD defense is scheduled in 2026. Presentation, March 2025.
In addition we are currently following promising Master students. In Gabon: Geordan Igouwe, Jean-Baptiste Mébalé, Eric Bapack, Gylain Ovono Allogo, Seguy Mihindou, Koel-Jemiel Lemondo-Ngoma, Lhamma Ngaissou. In Mali: Niankoro Diarra, Amadou Kolohogon.