Health Diagnostics

Making medically-supervised vision care globally accessible and affordable to large populations particularly those who are under-served

Develop a prototype for auto-diagnosis malaria platform and do observational research in Cambodia, especially low resource setting area.

Stephen Oliver and Elizabeth Bilsland at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom will develop a yeast-based screen to identify compounds inhibiting selected enzymes from parasitic filarial worms, which cause several common and debilitating diseases. Candidate enzymes as potential antifilarial drug targets will be selected based on their importance specifically in the adult stages of the parasite life cycle, against which current drugs are ineffective.

Paul McVeigh from Queen's University of Belfast in the United Kingdom will develop a diagnostic for filarial infections, which are caused by parasitic nematodes (roundworms) and can cause severe pain and disability. He will screen serum samples from filariasis patients to identify circulating microRNAs associated with the presence specifically of adult parasitic nematodes (macrofilariae) as candidate diagnostic biomarkers.

Jason Andrews and colleagues from Massachusetts General Hospital in the U.S. have developed a low-cost handheld device that allows rapid and quantitative detection of Loa loa helminthic parasites in the bloodstream by fluorescent photometry. Quantitative detection is important because individuals with high levels of Loa loa can be fatally sensitive to a widely administered drug used to treat another common parasitic worm Onchocerca volvulans. Conventional detection by microscopy is labor-intensive, time-consuming, and often impractical in the field.

Stephen Sowerby of the University of Otago in New Zealand has developed a quantitative cell-phone-based diagnostic and will test its ability to detect and monitor soil-transmitted helminth infections (intestinal worms), which are the most common infections worldwide. Quantitative monitoring of infection is crucial for evaluating therapeutic agents to combat the increase in drug resistant parasites.

Bebe Sylla and a team at American Friends of Guinea in the U.S. will use Short Message Service (SMS) and mobile laboratory technologies in rural Guinea to improve the identification of and response to neglected tropical diseases. Rapid and accurate response to the emergence of parasitic infections is critical for reducing transmission cycles, but particularly difficult in rural areas.

Andrew Steckl and Giovanni Pauletti of the University of Cincinnati in the U.S. will develop a paper-based urine test for the rapid non-invasive detection of the filarial Roundworm Loa loa, which causes the painful skin and eye disease loaisis, commonly found in western and central Africa. Current diagnostic approaches are invasive, involving visual detection of larvae in tissue or blood samples. The approach here utilizes the potential effect of parasite-released hormones found in the urine of infected individuals on the viscosity of animal blood spotted onto filter paper.

Lindsay Allen of ARS Western Human Nutrition Research Center in the U.S. will develop methods to rapidly and accurately measure concentrations of multiple micronutrients (vitamins and minerals) in small volumes of human breast milk. This will enable them to test whether micronutritional supplements during lactation can boost infant health and development. In Phase I, they established new methods to detect low concentrations of specific micronutrients including vitamin B12, iron, copper and zinc.

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.