Swiss TPH postdoctoral researcher Aurel Holzschuh has been awarded an Ambizione grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF). His project will investigate how malaria parasites associated with artemisinin partial resistance persist and spread in Tanzania, providing new insights to help address the growing threat of antimalarial drug resistance in Africa.
Malaria remains a major public health burden in sub-Saharan Africa. Artemisinin-based combination therapies are currently the main treatment for malaria caused by Plasmodium falciparum, the deadliest malaria parasite. However, parasites carrying mutations associated with partial resistance to artemisinin are now emerging in East Africa, including Tanzania. If these parasites continue to spread and resistance to artemisinin partner drugs also develops, current malaria treatments could become less effective.
“With the SNSF Ambizione project, we aim to move beyond simply detecting resistance to better understanding how malaria parasites associated with artemisinin partial resistance persist, spread, and are transmitted. This knowledge is essential to anticipate the evolution of resistance and to inform more effective surveillance and control strategies,” said Holzschuh.
The project, in collaboration with the Ifakara Health Institute (IHI) and the National Institute for Medical Research (NIMR) in Tanzania, will combine genomic and epidemiological data with single-cell transcriptomics, a method that allows researchers to examine gene activity in individual parasite cells from natural malaria infections. Building on existing malaria surveillance in Tanzania, the research will investigate whether resistant parasite lineages spread between regions, persist in humans and differ biologically from non-resistant parasites in ways that affect their transmission. The findings could help strengthen surveillance and response strategies and ultimately contribute to limiting the spread and impact of artemisinin partial resistant malaria in Africa.
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