Dr. de Jong has prior international research experience and recently completed her clinical training in infectious diseases at Stanford University. In order to foster her transition into an international research scientist, she now proposes to combine didactic training in epidemiology with a hypothesis driven project designed to better understand the determinants of tuberculosis transmission. This work will be conducted in a well-established research setting in the Gambia and mentored by faculty with complementary expertise. Over three consecutive summers she will obtain a Masters degree in epidemiology at the Netherlands Institute for Health Sciences. This curriculum provides a comprehensive survey of the principles and practices of epidemiologic research and is specifically structured to be spread over this period and integrated with an independent research project. The research project that she will pursue tests the hypothesis that genetic differences between mycobacterial strains contribute to variable rates of pulmonary cavitation and person- to- person transmission. It is well established that host and environmental factors greatly impact the clinical manifestations and consequences of infection with M. tuberculosis. However, little is known about the consequences of differences between mycobacterial strains. The combination of expertise the candidate has gained to date working in a molecular epidemiology laboratory and the clinical epidemiologic lessons that she will learn in the classroom will provide her the opportunity to formally address this issue in the field. Specifically, she will spend at least two years in The Gambia quantifying the propensity of clinical isolates of M. tuberculosis to cause cavitation and be transmitted to household contacts. Subsequently, at Stanford University, she will use a DNA microarray based comparative genomic approach to seek genetic correlates of these bacterial propensities. While it would be presumptuous to promise that these activities will have a major impact on the global burden of tuberculosis, it is likely that the proposed project will serve as a vehicle for her transition into an independent physician scientist focused on international translational clinical investigation.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
Fogarty International Center (FIC)
Type
Research Scientist Development Award - Research & Training (K01)
Project #
5K01TW006083-03
Application #
6782701
Study Section
Microbiology and Infectious Diseases B Subcommittee (MID)
Program Officer
Jessup, Christine
Project Start
2002-09-18
Project End
2006-08-31
Budget Start
2004-09-01
Budget End
2005-08-31
Support Year
3
Fiscal Year
2004
Total Cost
$111,996
Indirect Cost
Name
Stanford University
Department
Internal Medicine/Medicine
Type
Schools of Medicine
DUNS #
009214214
City
Stanford
State
CA
Country
United States
Zip Code
94305
Bold, Tyler D; Davis, Daphne C; Penberthy, Kristen K et al. (2012) Impaired fitness of Mycobacterium africanum despite secretion of ESAT-6. J Infect Dis 205:984-90
de Jong, Bouke C; Adetifa, Ifedayo; Walther, Brigitte et al. (2010) Differences between tuberculosis cases infected with Mycobacterium africanum, West African type 2, relative to Euro-American Mycobacterium tuberculosis: an update. FEMS Immunol Med Microbiol 58:102-5
de Jong, Bouke C; Antonio, Martin; Gagneux, Sebastien (2010) Mycobacterium africanum--review of an important cause of human tuberculosis in West Africa. PLoS Negl Trop Dis 4:e744
de Jong, Bouke C; Hammond, Abdulrahman; Otu, Jacob K et al. (2010) Immunogenicity of antigens from the TbD1 region present in M. africanum and missing from ""modern"" M. tuberculosis: a cross- sectional study. BMC Infect Dis 10:11
de Jong, Bouke C; Antonio, Martin; Awine, Timothy et al. (2009) Use of spoligotyping and large sequence polymorphisms to study the population structure of the Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex in a cohort study of consecutive smear-positive tuberculosis cases in The Gambia. J Clin Microbiol 47:994-1001
Jeffries, David J; Abernethy, Neil; de Jong, Bouke C (2009) Supervised learning for the automated transcription of spacer classification from spoligotype films. BMC Bioinformatics 10:248
de Jong, Bouke C; Hill, Philip C; Aiken, Alex et al. (2008) Progression to active tuberculosis, but not transmission, varies by Mycobacterium tuberculosis lineage in The Gambia. J Infect Dis 198:1037-43
Seale, Anna C; de Jong, Bouke C; Zaidi, Irfan et al. (2008) Effects of cryopreservation on CD4+ CD25+ T cells of HIV-1 infected individuals. J Clin Lab Anal 22:153-8
de Jong, B C; Hill, P C; Aiken, A et al. (2007) Clinical presentation and outcome of tuberculosis patients infected by M. africanum versus M. tuberculosis. Int J Tuberc Lung Dis 11:450-6
de Jong, Bouke C; Hill, Philip C; Brookes, Roger H et al. (2006) Mycobacterium africanum elicits an attenuated T cell response to early secreted antigenic target, 6 kDa, in patients with tuberculosis and their household contacts. J Infect Dis 193:1279-86

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