CAF Celebrates 30 Years

As the Central Analytical Facilities at Stellenbosch University marks 30 years, its story is not only one of advanced instruments, expanding laboratories and specialised research services. It is also a story of people: the staff who built the laboratories, adapted to new technologies, solved problems under pressure, and supported generations of researchers with skill, humour and care.

This human side of CAF is captured in the interview video, “CAF: 30 Years of Transformation.” The interview was led by Casey Christoffels from the CAF Electron Microscopy Unit, representing one of the younger members of the CAF team. She sat down with CAF’s two longest-serving lab managers: Mrs Riana Rossouw (right in the photo above) from the Elemental and Isotope Analysis Unit, and Dr Carel van Heerden (left in the photograph above) from the DNA Sequencing Unit.

The filming took place in both managers’ laboratories, before moving into the DNA foyer for the combined conversation. The result is a warm reflection across generations: a younger CAF staff member listening to two colleagues who have lived through much of the facility’s transformation.

Riana joined the Inductively Coupled Plasma laboratory in 2001 and officially became part of CAF at the beginning of 2002. Her earliest memory is vivid: a small, dark laboratory in the basement of the physics building, with limited space, wooden cupboards, acid stored in cabinets and very little room to move around the instrument. At that stage, the unit had one outdated Inductively Couple Plasma Atomic Emission Spectroscopy instrument (technology from the 1970s) and a far smaller footprint than it has today.

Over the years, the Elemental and Isotope Analysis Unit relocated, expanded and transformed. The laboratory moved into safer, brighter and more modern spaces, with better infrastructure, proper extraction and a much broader suite of analytical platforms. What started as a small analytical space has grown into a dynamic unit supporting a wide range of research applications and is now equipped with state-of-the-art mass spectrometers and laser ablation equipment for spatially resolved analyses.

“Considering how small my unit started, I am proud to be part of a dynamic unit that has evolved and expanded over the years,” Riana reflects. “Our footprint and equipment have grown significantly, and we now support a diverse range of research activities through an amazing team of analysts.”

Her reflections also reveal one of the realities often hidden behind analytical results. The work is rarely as simple as placing a sample into an instrument and waiting for an answer. Behind each report lies careful planning, sample preparation, method development, quality control, instrument optimisation and data interpretation. Researchers may see the final result, but CAF staff see the full journey behind it.

Carel, who joined CAF in 1997, remembers an earlier facility that was far more informal and much less integrated. In those days, individual units were largely self-contained. Staff were called operators rather than lab managers, and many units were essentially one-person operations. Each unit handled its own analyses, reports, billing and problem-solving, often with very little interaction across the broader CAF structure.

Today, that role has changed completely. Carel now manages a multi-person DNA Sequencing Unit with different divisions and dedicated staff. The lab manager’s role has become more strategic, involving planning, budgeting, service development, troubleshooting, user support and collaboration across units.

Both Riana and Carel also reflect on the prominent shifts that have taken place under the tenure of Prof Gary Stevens, the current CAF Director. Under his leadership, CAF has moved further toward a coordinated, sustainable and professionally managed core facility model. The shift has not only strengthened the scientific services, but also the structures that allow the laboratories to maintain high-end instruments, retain skilled staff and remain reliable over time.

For Carel, this sustainability is central to CAF’s future. A facility cannot survive on instruments alone. It needs people, planning, financial discipline, supplier relationships and a clear understanding of what it costs to produce high-quality data. Scientific excellence and business sustainability have had to develop together.

At the heart of the interview is the idea that CAF’s value lies not only in access to equipment, but in access to expertise. Carel recalls a recent discussion with a student whose project seemed well planned until one small detail changed the analytical approach entirely. Without a face-to-face discussion, the student may have generated technically good data that did not answer the real research question. “That is why we are here,” Carel says. “We are here to make sure that the student, the project and the analytical method actually meet and work together.”

The interview also captures the humour and resourcefulness that keep a facility like CAF moving. Carel tells the story of a sequencing workflow problem during the Covid period, when a critical component was no longer available. The solution came not from an expensive instrument accessory, but from a practical idea involving a garden pressure-spray bottle. It is exactly the kind of story that defines laboratory life: science, memory, teamwork and a little improvisation.

There is humour too in the shared understanding that instruments often break at the worst possible time — usually late on a Friday afternoon. As Carel puts it, when that happens, you can either laugh and fix it or have a miserable weekend. For Riana and Carel, that ability to keep going, to keep laughing and to support one another is part of what has made CAF a meaningful place to work.

The conversation also shows how much institutional memory matters. New instruments and technologies arrive, methods change, and research questions become more complex. But the deeper purpose remains the same: to help researchers produce reliable, meaningful results. As Riana notes, CAF’s location on campus makes this support especially valuable. Researchers can walk into the laboratory, discuss their data and receive guidance from people who understand both the instrument and the research context.

Looking to the next generation, both managers offer advice that is practical, honest and deeply human. Be curious. Ask questions. Be patient with students, even when they ask the same questions year after year. Be honest when mistakes happen. Protect the quality of the data. Do not cut corners. And, importantly, do not take life too seriously — because in a laboratory, something will always break, change or surprise you.

As CAF celebrates 30 years, the interview reminds us that the facility’s legacy is not held only in its instruments, laboratories or analytical outputs. It is held in the people who built, repaired, adapted, advised, laughed, trained and carried the facility through three decades of change. The more the technology changes, the more the heart of CAF stays the same.