Tulane University will receive approximately $11.2 million over seven years from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a division of the National Institutes of Health, to establish an International Center of Excellence in Malaria Research for West and Central Africa. The money will be awarded in response to a multi-institutional proposal from Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. Dr. Donald Krogstad, professor of Tropical Medicine at Tulane, will serve as the center's principal investigator and program director. Tulane is teaming up in this research with the Harvard School of Public Health, Boston College, Broad Institute of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and three institutions in Africa: Medical Research Council Laboratories (Fajara, The Gambia), University Cheikh Anta Diop (Dakar, Senegal) and the University of Bamako (Bamako, Mali).
The Tulane team's proposal, entitled "Population-based approach to Malaria Research and Control" outlines a seven-year project that will kick off in September and involve the collaborative efforts of 48 investigators. The goal of this multi-disciplinary research is to achieve malaria control in West and Central Africa, and ultimately in all parts of the world.
Like the other International Centers of Excellence in Malaria Research that are being established throughout the world, the center for West and Central Africa will carry out studies of the human impact and transmission of malaria at field sites in the affected region. The study sites are in Basse (a rural site on the Gambia River in The Gambia), Thies (an urban site in Senegal), and Dioro and Kenieroba (rural sites in Mali).
Investigators for the center at Tulane's School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine include: Joseph Keating, assistant professor of International Health and Development; Thomas P. Eisele, assistant professor, International Health and Development; Frances J. Mather, adjunct associate professor, Biostatistics; and Ivo Foppa, assistant professor of Epidemiology.