About the Authors

Billiah K. Bwana

Roles Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Software, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

kemuntobilia@gmail.com (BKB); mireji.paul@gmail.com (POM)

Affiliations Biotechnology Research Institute, Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization, Kikuyu, Kenya, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Embu, Embu, Kenya

Paul O. Mireji

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Supervision, Writing – review & editing

kemuntobilia@gmail.com (BKB); mireji.paul@gmail.com (POM)

‡ POM and AH are joint senior authors on this work.

Affiliation Biotechnology Research Institute, Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization, Kikuyu, Kenya

George F. Obiero

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Biochemistry and Biotechnology, Technical University of Kenya, Nairobi, Kenya

Consolata Gakii

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Computing and Information Technology, University of Embu, Embu, Kenya

Modesta O. Akoth

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Biotechnology Research Institute, Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization, Kikuyu, Kenya

Julius N. Mugweru

Roles Supervision, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, University of Embu, Embu, Kenya

Franklin N. Nyabuga

Roles Supervision, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, University of Embu, Embu, Kenya

Benson M. Wachira

Roles Data curation, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Biotechnology Research Institute, Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization, Kikuyu, Kenya

Rosemary Bateta

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Biotechnology Research Institute, Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization, Kikuyu, Kenya

Margaret M. Ng’ang’a

Roles Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Chemistry, School of Pure and Applied Sciences, Kenyatta University, Nairobi, Kenya

Ahmed Hassanali

Roles Writing – review & editing

‡ POM and AH are joint senior authors on this work.

Affiliations Biotechnology Research Institute, Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization, Kikuyu, Kenya, Department of Chemistry, School of Pure and Applied Sciences, Kenyatta University, Nairobi, Kenya

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.