Chidi Afamefule was a senior research officer at the University of Essex. His research focuses on the regulation of gene expression (activity) to increase photosynthesis efficiency and is designing CRISPR constructs to edit the Calvin Cycle enzymes in tobacco, a model crop used for plant science research. For the RIPE project, Chidi focused on RUBP Regeneration. He earned his bachelor’s degree in biology from the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid and the University of Manchester, and went on to complete his doctorate in natural sciences and botany from the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research at the University of Cologne. He completed a postdoctoral research position focusing on gene editing and photosynthesis at the University of Essex. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for Research in Agricultural Genomics (CRAG) in Barcelona where he works on developing plants more resilient to drought by modifying their photosynthetic pathway.