Staff Profile

Professor Grace Mugumbate holds the following academic and professional qualifications; PhD in Chemistry (University of Cape Town, South Africa.), MSc; MSc. in Analytical; Chemistry (University of Zimbabwe); BSc. Honours in Chemistry (University of Zimbabwe); Grad C.E (University of Zimbabwe)  Professor Mugumbate is an erudite and Education 5.0 compliant scholar who has a wealth of experience in academia. She joined the Midlands State University from the Chinhoyi University of Technology.  Her career began in 1988 as a Laboratory Technician in the Institute of Mining Research and the Department Metallurgical Engineering at University of Zimbabwe. She then taught for ten years at various schools as an A’ Level Chemistry teacher, spending the greater part of her teaching career at Fletcher High School. She joined Midlands State University at its inception and served as a Teaching Assistant and Staff Development Fellow from 2000 to 2004 before becoming a Lecturer from 2005 to 2006 in the Department of Chemical Technology. She then left MSU to pursue her doctoral studies at the University of Cape Town (UCT). Upon completing her studies in 2010, she worked as a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in the Kelly Chibale Research Group at the UCT as the lead researcher in the Computational Division. In April 2013 she joined the ChEMBL group at EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute (UK) working on a project that focused on identifying targets for anti-tuberculosis (TB) compounds. During this period, she had an opportunity to work with Professor Tom Blundell at University of Cambridge in the UK, as a Visiting Research Scientist, During her stint with EMBL-EBI, she also worked as a Data Curator and as an Off-site Scientific Training Officer before joining Chinhoyi University of Technology, Zimbabwe in October 2017 as an Associate Professor in the Department of Chemistry, School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. In 2019, she was appointed as the Executive Director of Research and Graduate Studies, a position she held until her appointment in March 2021 as the Midlands State University Pro Vice-Chancellor Research, Innovation and Indusrialisation.  A prolific academic and researcher involved in collaborative, innovative and interdisciplinary research and has published extensively in reputable refereed journals. She leads the Drug Discovery and Informatics Research Group that specializes in Computer-aided drug discovery and development and is conducting ground-breaking work on medicinal drug discovery and development in Zimbabwe.   Over the years, she has attracted highly prestigious and competitive local and international grants that include the following: Grand Challenge – Drug Discovery Africa grant,  The Third World Academy of Sciences (TWAS)/UNESCO Research Grant Award; The Medicine for Malaria Venture; The Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions COFUND (grant number 291772), EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoc (EIPOD) programme – prestigious award for outstanding researchers involved in interdisciplinary research.  Furthermore, she is a member of the team spearheading the establishment of pharmaceutical manufacturing plants by Zimbabwean universities. 

Selected Publications

1. Douglas A. M. Ruhwaya, Brilliant Nyathi, Gadzikano Munyuki, Ryman Shoko & Grace Mugumbate (2023) Controlling drug resistance by targeting Plasmodium falciparum heat shock protein 70-1, a chaperone at the centre of protein quality control mechanism: a review, All Life, 16:1, 2202301, DOI: 10.1080/26895293.2023.2202301
2. Tukulula, M., Olasupo, I. A., Mugumbate, G. C., Lobb, K. A., Klein, R., Sayed, Y., … & Kaye, P. T. (2022). Synthesis, Stereochemistry and In Vitro STD NMR and In Silico HIV-1 PR Enzyme-binding Potential of MBH-derived Inhibitors. Journal of Molecular Structure, 133716.
3. Mugumbate, G., Nyathi, B., Zindoga, A., & Munyuki, G. (2021). Application of Computational Methods in Understanding Mutations in Mycobacterium tuberculosis Drug Resistance. Frontiers in Molecular Biosciences, 837.
4. David Mendez, Anna Gaulton, A. Patricia Bento, Jon Chambers, Marleen De Veij, Eloy Félix, María Paula Magariños, Juan F. Mosquera, Prudence Mutowo, Michal Nowotka, María Gordillo- Marañón, Fiona Hunter, Laura Junco, Grace Mugumbate, Milagros Rodriguez-Lopez, Francis Atkinson, Nicolas Bosc, Chris J. Radoux, Aldo Segura-Cabrera, Anne Hersey and Andrew R. Leach, (2018), ChEMBL: Towards Direct Deposition of Bioassay Data, Nucleic Acids Research, 1-11, doi: 10.1093/nar/gky1075.
5. Mugumbate, G., Mendes, V., Blaszczyk, M., Sabbah, M., Papadatos, G., Lelievre, J., Ballell, L., Barros, D., Abell, C., Blundell, T.L. and Overington, J.P., 2017. Target Identification of Mycobacterium tuberculosis Phenotypic Hits Using a Concerted Chemogenomic, Biophysical, and Structural Approach. Frontiers in Pharmacology, 8, 681.
6. Mugumbate, G., & Overington, J. P. (2015). The relationship between target-class and the physicochemical properties of antibacterial drugs. J. Bioorg. Med. Chem., http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bmc.2015.04.063
7. Mugumbate G, Abrahams KA, Cox JAG, Papadatos G, van Westen G, et al. (2015) Mycobacterial Dihydrofolate Reductase Inhibitors Identified Using Chemogenomic Methods and In Vitro Validation. PLoS ONE 10(3): e0121492. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0121492.