I'm a PhD candidate in Computer Science at the University of Cape Town, working on AI for explainable health risk prediction and decision support using multimodal and heterogeneous health data. I explore the integration of symbolic AI, particularly ontologies and knowledge graphs, with machine learning and Bayesian networks within a hybrid AI architecture. My PhD research is conducted within the Artificial Intelligence Research Unit (AIRU), which hosts South Africa's Centre for Artificial Intelligence Research (CAIR) network. I'm supervised by Prof. Deshen Moodley.

Until June 2026, I was consultant at the World Bank-UNHCR Joint Data Centre on Forced Displacement (JDC) as a World Bank Group Africa fellow. I researched differences in malaria vulnerability and incidence between refugees and non-refugees in Uganda, using statistical analysis and predictive modelling. I'm a L'Oréal-UNESCO For Women In Science Young Talents Awardee, recipient of the Generation Google Scholarship, and alumni of the Hasso Plattner Institute and Mawazo fellowship programs.

Prior to my PhD, I graduated with Distinction from the University of Manchester, where I earned an MSc in Advanced Computer Science with a specialization in AI. I did my dissertation in deep learning and human-robot interaction at the Cognitive Robotics Lab, supervised by Prof. Angelo Cangelosi. I was a Chevening Scholar, funded by the UK Government's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.

I was born and raised in Nairobi, Kenya. I spent the first few years of my career working as a software engineer, and also had a brief stint in technology consulting. I enjoy speaking, presenting, and writing about technology (and more recently, AI for health), as well as mentorship and outreach in the field. I am currently a member of the global Climate Sensitive Infectious Disease Network (CSIDNet). I serve on the Events and Gatherings committee, helping bring together researchers, software developers, and practitioners to collaborate on climate-health tools. Previously, I was a data science mentor at KamiLimu, and, before that, a contributing technical writer at Scotch.io and RealPython.com, where I wrote programming tutorials on Python and its web frameworks. I have also been active with Django Girls, and have volunteered as a coach for workshops in Nairobi, Mombasa, and Manchester.

On a weekend, you can probably find me hiking one of Cape Town's beautiful trails (Platteklip Gorge, Chapman's Peak, and Little Lion's Head are firm favourites!), trying to get to a sub-30 minute parkrun, or road tripping across the Western Cape and beyond rediscovering what adventure looks like in Nairobi and surrounds after nearly four years in Cape Town... but I am equally happy curled up on the couch with a good audiobook or podcast.

You can reach me by email at [my_first_name] . [my_last_name] @ gmail . com.