ASCB Course On Parasites For African Scientists Funded By Carnegie Corporation

Main Category: Tropical Diseases
Also Included In: Medical Students / Training;  Biology / Biochemistry
Article Date: 15 Jul 2008 - 3:00 PDT

email to a friend   printer friendly   view / write opinions   rate article

The Carnegie Corporation of New York has funded a new three-year $506,800 international scientific outreach program through the American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) to bring new perspectives and new technologies to emerging research institutions in sub-Saharan Africa. The first stage of the program will take place this month in Morogoro, Tanzania, when ASCB members present a "short course" on protozoan parasites -- like Plasmodium which causes malaria or trypanosomes which give rise to sleeping sickness -- in cooperation with scientists from Sokoine University in Tanzania and the Seattle Biomedical Research Institute (SBRI) in the U.S. The course is aimed at advanced students of biology and medicine plus young faculty from African universities.

Modern cell biology is not yet widely taught in Africa, explains J. Richard McIntosh, a member of the ASCB International Affairs Committee (IAC) and principal investigator for the Carnegie grant. Yet new advances in the discipline have revolutionized research in major threats to human health and well-being. Protozoan parasites that cause crippling and lethal diseases in East Africa are a good example of such threats. This course, like those planned to follow, will provide valuable, cell-based know-how, materials, and technologies to African researchers.

The first course - held July 17-20 at Sokoine University in Morogoro, Tanzania, will be followed by a second ASCB short course at a West African university in 2009. Additional workshops and courses will take place in future years. Other course locations will be selected in partnership with sub-Saharan African universities. The sites to be selected will be ones where faculty has already succeeded in modernizing some facilities and providing aspects of an up-to-date education in biology. ASCB will provide technology and training with its courses to help talented and enterprising African scientists expand and deepen the job they have already begun, sometimes against stiff odds.

Sokoine University is an excellent example, according to McIntosh. It has hosted several previous courses on the molecular biology and immunology of malaria through a partnership between the SBRI and Morogoro Regional Hospital. "By taking advantage of existing infrastructure and logistical support, the ASCB can both contribute to putting on an excellent course and learn by collaborating with the experienced faculty of Sokoine and the SBRI, as IAC members jump-start the African teaching project," McIntosh explains.

----------------------------
Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release.
----------------------------

The Sokoine short course will be taught by scientist-volunteers from both SBRI and ASCB. Besides McIntosh (University of Colorado), other instructors will include Patrick Duffy (SBRI), Eva Gluenz (Oxford University), Keith Gull (Oxford University), Mahasin Osman (Cornell), David Roos (University of Pennsylvania), Marilyn Parson (SBRI), and William Wickstead (Oxford). Paul Gwakisa will host the short course for Sokoine University.

Source: John Fleischman
American Society for Cell Biology