Faces of Innovation: Dr. Geoffrey Siwo, researcher at University of Notre Dame

Faces of Innovation—a new GHTC project that features scientists on the front lines of research and development on new global health tools and technologies—profiles Mohammad Ariful Islam, who we met at the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene Annual Conference. Ariful researches influenza in Bangladesh with funding from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.My name: Md. Ariful Islam, MSSc, MPHMy name: Md Ariful Islam, MSS, MPHWhere I work: International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) I’m funded by: US Centers for Disease Control and PreventionMy research: We’re doing influenza surveillance in Bangladesh. Surveillance is important to detect novel influenza and to understand what type of influenza strains are circulating Bangladesh. Our surveillance objectives are to identify individuals and clusters of people with life-threatening infections with influenza virus and to characterize the diversity of strains of influenza in circulation in Bangladesh. We’re working in Bangladesh to detect novel influenza strains so that we can take immediate measures if needed.Motivation: Every day we work with patients. We are happy that we can use our efforts for the betterment of people in our country. Influenza is a severe disease for many patients, and if a disease outbreak occurs in Bangladesh, it may spread throughout the world—so I think we are doing a great job for the people. Why US federal support is critical: I believe that influenza is a problem not only for Bangladesh, it’s not only a problem for the US citizen, it is a problem for the whole world. If there is a disease outbreak like bird flu or swine flu, then all of the people in the world will suffer. The US policymakers and funders are doing a great job of funding this project to investigate influenza.When I’m not in the lab: I’m a big fan of cricket, so when I get some time I play with my colleagues. It also keep my body fit. If I want to work more, then I need to exercise more—so I like cricket.

Faces of Innovation—a new GHTC project that features scientists on the front lines of research and development on new global health tools and technologies—profiles Dr. Joseph Tucker, who we met at the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene Annual Conference, who uses grassroots methods, like open challenge contests, to influence health messages and interventions in local communities, at the University of North Carolina. My Name: Joseph Tucker, MD, PhD. Where I work: University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.  I’m funded by: National Institutes of Health  My research: My research is in sexually transmitted diseases (STD), including HIV, in low- and middle-income countries and is primarily focused on diagnostics. We are interested in having open challenge contests where we solicit ideas from the community and then select great ideas and implement them. We’ve used this open challenge approach to come up with new ideas for promoting HIV and STD testing in a wide range of contests. In many parts of China, for example, gay men hesitate to get tested for HIV and many campaigns are top-down—they’re focused on expert-driven ideas and solutions. The idea with the open challenge approach is to have grassroots ideas from local communities influence the messaging and services and, in this case, for HIV testing. We had an open challenge contest where local gay men contributed images, memes, and short messages, and those all fed into the intervention to promote HIV testing for gay men.  Motivation: There’s a huge unmet need in terms of low- and middle-income countries and diagnostics. For me, personally, I do a lot of research in China. I studied Mandarin in college…there’s a number of different links between me and the city of Guangzhou. It’s been fun to develop this line of research over the years.  Why federal support is critical: These open challenges are a very low-cost way to engage communities and add value. Many times, we hire companies and it’s a clunky, top-down, expert-based approach, but there’s so much innovation within local communities—and the US government has recognized this for many years. There are many federal agencies that use open challenge contests and, I think, this is a simple, effective way of improving global health. When I’m not in the lab: I have two sons who are seven and four months old, and they keep me very busy.