Lesley Scott is an associate professor and Divisional Director of Research and Development and Innovation at the Wits Diagnostic Innovation Hub at the University of the Witwatersrand. She has a PhD in Molecular Medicine and Haematology from the University of the Witwatersrand awarded in 2004. She has >20 years’ experience in laboratory medicine designing, developing, and evaluating innovative and affordable diagnostics to advance public health in priority diseases HIV, TB and recently COVID19. During the COVID19 pandemic, Lesley lead a team of data scientists to continuously monitor laboratory derived SARS-CoV-2 N-gene target cycle thresholds (Ct) as an early indicator of change in disease caseload, which helped inform the global scientific community to identify the Omicron VOC. Through NIH funding, she continues to collaborate with scientists from Boston University to investigate South Africa’s national TB cohort data to better understand gaps in the TB care cascade. Lesley is also the inventor of the “Dried Culture Spot” technology used to ensure the quality of molecular TB tests, for which she was awarded the African Innovation Foundation award for social impact and the Gauteng Accelerator Program award for Innovation and entrepreneurship. This work culminated into Wits Universities’ first spin-off company, SmartSpotQuality, with the patented technology now used in ~47 countries. In her academic capacity, Lesley continues to support the careers of young scientists.