Maternal, Newborn, and Adolescent Health

Hayley Dickinson of Monash University in Australia will evaluate the spiny mouse, which is the only rodent that naturally menstruates, as a new animal model for developing and testing contraceptives. Menstruation is an essential feature of human reproduction, and is regulated by hormonal contraceptives. However, current contraceptives like the contraceptive pill can cause side effects such as anxiety and low libido. A small animal model that mimics human menstruation would be valuable for testing new contraceptives that have fewer side effects.

John Spencer of the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom along with Sean Deoni of the University of Colorado in the U.S. are assessing the trajectory of brain development during the first two years of age using a range of imaging, physiological and behavioral assessment tools to understand how development is affected by environmental factors such as nutrition, stress, and parent-child interaction.

Laura Jelliffe-Pawlowski of the University of California, San Francisco in the U.S. is developing an algorithm to measure gestational age from metabolic markers taken during routine newborn screening. Measuring accurate gestational age is important for assessing infant health such as brain development, but it is challenging in developing countries without specialized equipment and expertise. In Phase I, they developed a statistical model using data on 51 metabolic markers from around 730,000 newborns in the U.S.

Caroline Ochieng of the Stockholm Environment Institute in Sweden is evaluating an approach to stimulate women in Kenya to regularly visit health clinics during pregnancy and after birth to improve maternal health. Currently, the majority visits only once, and infant and maternal mortality are high. To encourage the women to keep additional appointments they will give them a health credit voucher that can be exchanged for a specific cash amount or retained for a subsequent appointment, for up to four appointments, when they receive another voucher worth twice as much.

Kumanan Wilson of Ottawa Hospital Research Institute in Canada is developing an algorithm to estimate gestational age using specific metabolic analytes found in blood spots collected routinely from newborns in many countries. Knowing the precise age of infants is important for evaluating development particularly of brain function. It is currently measured by ultrasound, which requires expertise and expensive equipment, and is not available in many countries.

Margo Klar of the University of Florida in the U.S. will develop a simple and re-usable ceramic device for cutting umbilical cords to reduce the risk of infection in newborns in developing countries. In limited resource settings, cords are often cut with knives or razor blades, which are unsafe and unclean. In Phase I they tested several ceramic-based prototypes on discarded umbilical cords and developed a design that was easy to clean and use, and enabled a simple hygienic cut while reducing potential bacterial exposure.

Sean Moore and colleagues at Cincinnati Children's Hospital in the U.S. will generate a mouse model of human environmental enteropathy, which is characterized by stunted growth and physiological defects in the gut, and is caused by malnutrition and repeated infections. The model will be used to test whether environmental enteropathy is affected by diet and contaminated water, and whether it reduces the effect of oral vaccines. In Phase I, they proved that feeding mice a nutritionally deficient diet mimicked at least some of the features of the human disease.

Laura Woollett of the University of Cincinnati in the U.S., in collaboration with the MRC International Nutrition Group in The Gambia, will test whether increasing plasma cholesterol in pregnant mothers from developing countries can improve fetal growth rates and reduce the associated risk of mortality and developmental defects. They hypothesized that the high incidence of low birth weight in developing countries is caused by lower levels of cholesterol in pregnant women.

Frans Walther of the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute in the U.S. will adapt a low-cost synthetic lung surfactant for aerosol delivery as a non-invasive and simple method to support breathing in premature infants. Surfactant is composed of lipids and proteins, and keeps the lungs open during expiration. It is normally administered to premature infants with breathing difficulties by tracheal intubation, which can be problematic in low-resource settings and cause side effects.

Alistair McEwan of The University of Sydney in Australia will develop a simple, low-cost electronic device built from recycled LEDs and microcontrollers to measure subcutaneous fat levels and thereby determine nutritional status in infants. Current methods are expensive or require a trained health worker, and as such are unsuitable for use particularly in developing countries. In Phase I, they performed several design iterations leading to the production of a low-cost prototype that was used for a small trial in newborns.