Biography
Yalemtsehay Mekonnen is Professor of Cell and Human Physiology in the College of Natural and Computational Sciences at Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. She obtained her BSc in Biology in 1977 and her MSc in 1980 at Addis Ababa University as its first woman graduate, earned her PhD in Human Physiology at the University of Heidelberg in 1988, and in 2009 became the first woman to attain the rank of full professor of physiology in Ethiopia.
Professor Mekonnen has published extensively on respiratory physiology, medicinal plants and related biomedical topics, and has advised many MSc and PhD students over four decades. She served as Head of the Department of Biology and as Director of the Aklilu Lemma Institute of Biology, played a pivotal role in establishing the Leishmania East African Platform (LEAP) linking Kenya, Uganda, Sudan and Ethiopia, and was Principal Vice-President of the Ethiopian Academy of Sciences from 2019 to 2025. She received the 2015 African Union Kwame Nkrumah Scientific Award for women in science and served as an Ambassador Scientist of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. She is FEAS, FAAS and FTWAS. She has provided two biographies for LAS publication.
Her career exemplifies the scientific leadership and mentorship of young researchers, especially women, that Liberia seeks as it rebuilds its universities and health research institutions.