Health Diagnostics

Aaron Jenkins of the University of Sydney in Australia will combine genomics approaches with physical chemistry to identify the organisms and environmental factors in riverbeds that support the survival and spread of the bacterium, Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi, which causes typhoid. Aquatic environments are a major reservoir of typhoid, but how the bacteria survive in these conditions is unclear, making it difficult to prevent the disease spreading to humans. They hypothesize that S.

Matthew DeLisa of Cornell University in the U.S. will create a cell-free synthetic biology platform for low-income settings that produces thermostable polysaccharide-based conjugate vaccines against diarrheal pathogens upon the addition of water to a single tube. Half-a-million children under age five die each year from diarrhea and dysentery, the majority in low- and middle-income countries. Two major causes of bacterial diarrhea are enterotoxigenic E. coli (ETEC) and Shigella strains.

Gemma Langridge of Quadram Institute Bioscience in the United Kingdom, along with co-investigators Aaron Jenkins of the University of Sydney in Australia and France Daigle of the University of Montreal in Canada, will collect different isolates of S. Typhi, which causes typhoid fever, to analyze genomic structure, growth, and gene expression to better understand how it can survive at low levels in water, and determine how it can be reactivated for monitoring. Typhoid fever is a potentially fatal disease associated with exposure to contaminated water. S.

Andrew Jackson of the University of Liverpool in the United Kingdom will determine whether the amoeba, Acanthamoeba, which is commonly found in water and soil, acts as a host for Salmonella Typhi bacteria, which cause typhoid fever, to support growth and disease spread in Malawi. Typhoid fever is a systemic, potentially fatal illness, usually contracted by consuming contaminated drinking water. An estimated 11-21 million cases occur worldwide each year.

France Daigle of the University of Montreal in Canada will identify the microorganisms that enable the survival of the typhoid fever-causing bacterium, Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi, at low levels in water, and thereby enhances disease spread. Typhoid fever spreads through contaminated food and water, and results in over 125,000 deaths annually worldwide. S. Typhi are so-called auxotrophic bacteria because they rely on an external source of the essential amino acids that they need to grow.

Ahmed Ebrahim of St. Paul Hospital Millenium Medical College in Ethiopia will develop an electronic stethoscope, similar to the currently available manual stethoscopes but with advanced technology to overcome those low sound levels that cannot be easily picked up by traditional stethoscopes.

Alezer Abeje of Alert Center will develop an Android-based fetal heart monitoring system using Xlab Digital that can be accessible at low cost and easy to use by health workers at remote health facilities to improve the quality of obstetric care.

Kinde Anlay of Jimma University in Ethiopia will design and develop hardware for a diagnostic system that can be used as artificial intelligence for early diagnosis of malaria and TB by attaching a smartphone camera to the ocular lense of a microscope by an adapter designed for this purpose.

Galan Ayana of Jimma University in Ethiopia will develop a hemoglobin-measuring device that will reach the unreached communities easily through health workers in remote health facilities because it is non-invasive, affordable, and comfortable to use for pregnant women for the diagnosis of anemia.

Rajeev Shrestha and colleagues at Dhulikhel Hospital, Kathmandu University in Nepal will apply metagenomic, next generation sequencing technology to identify causative pathogens of fatal acute encephalitis to improve diagnosis and treatment. Acute encephalitis syndrome (AES) annually affects over 100,000 individuals in low- and middle-income countries, causing substantial morbidity and mortality. It is a diverse disease caused by over 100 different pathogens, including viruses and parasites, making accurate diagnosis difficult, even in high-resource settings.