Science award for young Cameroonian women's work on herbal medicine

In Cameroon's rural north, very few girls go on to enjoy careers in science. Sabine Adeline Fanta Yadang, a neuroscience doctor, and Hadidjatou Dairou, PhD student of cellular physiology, have overcome prejudice and smashed through the glass ceiling.

They have been recognised for the quality of their research, along with 28 others from sub-Saharan Africa, by the L'Oreal-UNESCO for Women in Science Young Talents programme.

UNESCO says the programme supports "young women researchers around the world to pursue scientific careers at home or abroad".

Both women were distinguished for their research into the potential of Cameroon's traditional herbal medicines in the treatment of heart disease and Alzheimer's.

They work in a laboratory at Yaounde's Institute for Medical Research and Medicinal Plant Studies (IMPM).

In the lab, Dairou is carefully emptying the contents of a pipette into a Petri dish.

Under her white coat she proudly wears a traditional African dress.

Dairou's interest in herbal medicine goes back to her years as a pharmacology student at the public University of Ngaoundere, in the country's north.

"I've seen what a plant extract does to the human body and how that can help people I know," she says.

The UNESCO programme picked out her research into the "potential of the indigenous Garcinia Kola plant for treatment of cardiovascular disease".

Overcoming workplace discrimination

Fanta Yadang is injecting samples into test tubes before putting them in a centrifuge.

She likes to be known as a Moundang, a community from Cameroon's Far North region, where her grand-parents took herbal cures.

"I wanted to become a doctor, but I didn't get good enough marks. I wanted to help my fellow people so I became interested in medicinal plants," she says.

"In a region where girls are not encouraged to go to school, she stood up against stereotypes and overcame workplace discrimination," according to UNESCO.