Second award from NIAID will span over seven years.
Case Western Reserve University received a $27-million contract that will stretch over seven years from the NIAID to continue its research into tuberculosis (TB). This is the second grant awarded to the university’s Tuberculosis Research Unit (TBRU). The previous $28-million funding was in 1998, also for a seven-year period.
The contract will bolster TBRU’s multidisciplinary, international approach to TB research. The center has collaborations in Uganda, Brazil, South Africa, and Philippines. “Renewal of this research program is a wonderful opportunity to bring together new colleagues in the United States, Uganda, and South Africa for TB research focused on understanding how the infection is transmitted and why some people go on to develop active disease, whereas most contain the infection,” comments W. Henry Boom, M.D., principal investigator for the new contract and professor of medicine at the School of Medicine and University Hospitals Case Medical Center. “These studies will impact development of new vaccines, diagnostics tests, and treatment for TB.”
The international consortium of physician and research scientists will conduct studies of the genetics, immunology, microbiology, and epidemiology of TB. The Uganda-Case Research Collaboration with colleagues at Makerere University, Mulago Hospital, and the Joint Clinical Research Center in Kampala, Uganda, will reportedly feature prominently in this new contract. Other collaborators include University of Capetown, the South African TB Vaccine Initiative, the Aeras Global TB Vaccine Foundation, Colorado State University, Oregon Health & Science University, Public Health Research Institute, Saint Louis University, University of Arkansas, and University of Washington, Institute for Systems Biology and Infectious Diseases Research Institute.
