Geeks guide to the best South African science stories of 2017

We should be very proud of our South African scientists who made major breakthroughs in the science and technology industry.

Here is a list of five scientific new findings and technologies made in 2017 by our homegrown talent:

1. How life on earth began

In a laboratory at Wits University scientists believe they have replicated how life began before a time when there were tissues, cells or even DNA.

And it was no earth-moving big bang, just a couple of molecules hooking up.

2. SA robot geeks take one small step to Mars

Ryan Beech's robots spend their days laying explosive charges and performing other high-risk tasks, but he has set his sights much higher - on programming robots to work on Mars.

Beech is heading one of four South African teams to have entered the Centennial Space Robotics Challenge, a competition run by Nasa aimed at finding the world's best robotics programmers and enlisting their help for potential future missions to the Red Planet.

3. SA part of scientific breakthrough observing collision of neutron stars

A whole new era in astrophysics has begun‚ and a South African team has been part of it.

Two massive neutron stars did what they've always done – albeit once every million years: collided and merged so spectacularly that the same amount of energy as three times the mass of the sun was emitted.

But now‚ for the first time in history‚ human beings on a little speck called Planet Earth were able to witness it because their telescopes - thousands of kilometres apart - were able to point in that direction together and locate exactly where it was happening and also what was happening.

4. UCT science saves millions

A cheap mass-produced plastic heart valve, invented and made in Cape Town, is expected to save the lives of millions of young people.

After eight years of research, 150 rheumatic heart disease patients will have it inserted in 2018 in a full-scale clinical trial.

Instead of open heart surgery, which requires expensive machines and specialist hospitals and surgeons, the valve can be inserted at a rural hospital by a general surgeon through a small incision.

5. Lab-in-a-box won't lie

Like a fingerprint, DNA does not lie.

Now science, through the creation of multiple online libraries of the DNA sequences of endangered and invasive species, has added a weapon to the arsenal of wildlife crime fighters.

The Lab-in-a-Box was launched in the Kruger National Park on Monday at the 7th International Barcode for Life conference.