MSc. Clinical Biochemistry (UZ, 2006), BSc. Hons Applied Biology/Biochemistry (NUST, Zimbabwe, 1997),

Currently a senior lecturer of clinical biochemistry and genetics at the University of Zimbabwe (UZ), Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences. Her research area is pharmacogenomics and personalized medicine genomics. Danai’s D43 postdoctoral project is entitled “Strengthening Gut Micriobiome Research in Zimbabwe”.

In July 2020, Danai set up a not-for profit mentorship program, the African Excellence in Research Initiative (AFRIESEARCHI), targeting African postgraduate and early career researchers, pursuing careers in science, technology, engineering, medicine, and mathematics (STEMM). Together with a consortium of USA alumni, and other female scientists, she was recently awarded a grant, by the USA Embassy, Harare’s Alumni Engagement Innovation Fund, to set up a formalized research mentorship program, in Zimbabwe. Guided by her postdoc mentors, she is also involved in community initiatives including the Harare Pharmacovigilance Study, and the Viral Surveillance and Discovery in Zimbabwe Project

She is registered as a Clinical Scientist: Chemical Pathologist with the Medical Laboratory and Clinical Scientist of Zimbabwe (MLCSCZ Registration No.512097). She has obtained a Master Degree in chemical pathology from the University of Zimbabwe and joined the Infectious Diseases Research Laboratory (IDRL), Department of Medicine, College of Health Sciences, University of Zimbabwe as a Senior Clinical Research Scientist where she has been Conducting both research and routine clinical laboratory assays and in particular molecular diagnostic testing. Her main focus has been flagging up the problems of HIV drug resistance (HIVDR) in the country, defining the genetic correlates and the epidemiology of HIVDR, and the extent of ART cross-resistance in people living with HIV from specific ART regimens. She has also been conducting comparative analysis of low-cost point mutation assay for the detection of HIV drug resistance mutations to standard Sanger Sequencing as well as to develop Next generation sequencing for HIV drug resistance locally and send them off to a commercial entity for the Illumina sequencing reads.  She has also been working on validating and implementing Novel COVID-19 Molecular Assays that can be feasibly done in Zimbabwe