By Bio-IT World Staff
June 23, 2010 | The Wellcome Trust and the National Institutes of Health have launched a $38 million partnership focused on Africa to study how genes and the environment, including diet, work together to affect cancer, heart disease, and other diseases.
The Human Heredity and Health in Africa Project (H3 Africa) will receive at least $12 million from the Wellcome Trust and $5 million a year from the NIH, along with administrative and scientific support, over the next five years. The NIH has provided $750 000 to kick-start the project.
Previous research suggests that there is greater genetic diversity in African populations than those in Europe and Asia. Researchers hope that the project will shed light on the way genes influence how individuals respond to infection and medications. Working with thousands people in Africa may unveil rare genetic variations and in turn open up new ways to diagnose disease and develop treatments.
The African Society for Human Genetics is helping to organize research groups. Key to the project will be building research capacity, including infrastructure and training in African countries such as Cameroon, Ghana, Mali, Sudan, Tanzania, and Tunisia. Two working groups, on communicable and non-communicable disease, have been set up to help guide the initiative. These will convene for a series of planning meetings at the University of Oxford in August and Cape Town, South Africa, in the autumn.
"In the past, many research projects simply took samples from Africa and conducted the studies back in Western labs," said Charles N Rotimi, President of the African Society and Director of the Center for Research on Genomics and Global Health at the National Human Genome Research Institute, in a press release.
"H3 Africa will build the capacity for African researchers to study African populations to solve African problems, and will create strong collaborations between African researchers and those in Europe, the United States, and other parts of the world."