Target Malaria Uganda
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Target Malaria is a not-for-profit research consortium that aims to develop and share new, cost-effective and sustainable genetic technologies to modify mosquitoes and reduce malaria transmission.
Target Malaria started as a university-based research programme and has grown to include scientists, stakeholder engagement teams, regulatory affairs experts, project management teams, risk assessment specialists and communications professionals from Africa, North America and Europe. Target Malaria receives core funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and from Open Philanthropy. Individual labs also received additional funding from a variety of sources to support each lab’s work, including but not limited to : the Department for Food Environment and Rural Affairs-DEFRA (UK), the European Commission, the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis (UK), the National Institutes of Health-NIH (USA), the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology-UNCST, Ugandan Ministry of Health, the Wellcome Trust (UK), and the World Bank.
Target Malaria’s vision is a world free of malaria.
We cannot win the fight against malaria alone and our aim is for the technology to be complementary to current malaria efforts. We aim to achieve excellence in all areas of our work, creating a path for responsible research and development of genetic technologies. We are co-developing both our technologies and the associated knowledge base as well as ensuring our work is evidence-driven so we can deliver safe and effective technologies to those who need it. We are committed to be open and accountable in our work, relationships and decisions.
Read our full Vision, Mission, Values Statement.
As a grantee from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Target Malaria follows the Global Access pledge. It means: (a) knowledge and information gained from the Project is promptly and broadly disseminated; and (b) the Funded Developments will be made available and accessible at an affordable price to people most in need within developing countries. Target Malaria also follows the Foundation’s Open Access Policy that enables the unrestricted access and reuse of all peer-reviewed published research funded, in whole or in part, by the foundation, including any underlying data sets.
Our teams are organised around ‘functions’, often working across multiple locations. Learn about the functions of our teams below:
The Science teams
The Stakeholder Engagement and Communications Team
The Regulatory Affairs Team
The Risk Team
The Project Management Team
Our Partner Institutions
Target Malaria's team in Uganda works in collaboration with the Uganda Virus Research Institue (UVRI), based in Entebbe and is headed by Dr. Jonathan Kayondo.
Context of our work
Uganda has one of the highest global burden of malaria cases, with over 90% of the population at risk, malaria remains Uganda’s leading cause of death, especially in children. The disease causes immense detrimental health effects and is responsible for 30 to 50% of outpatient visits and 15 to 20% of hospital admissions. The average economic loss in Uganda due to malaria annually is over $500 million. In 2020, WHO reported that there were an estimated 20,4 million malaria cases and over 30,900 estimated deaths in the country.
Target Malaria Uganda is hosted at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI). The institute engages in health research on human infections and disease processes associated with or linked to viral aetiology. Target Malaria Uganda is led by Dr. Jonathan Kayondo, who is the Senior Research Officer for the Department of Entomology, and the current acting Head of Department of Entomology at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI). Target Malaria activities fall under the Department of Entomology and Vector Biology, which focuses on the study of various arboviral vectors, especially yellow fever, dengue, chikungunya and malaria. The Division is involved in capacity building and provides advice on vector control to the Government of Uganda.
Target Malaria Uganda
Photograph of Jonathan Kayondo
Dr. Jonathan Kayondo
Target Malaria Uganda's Principal Investigator
Dr. Jonathan Kayondo is Principal Investigator for Target Malaria in Uganda. He is also Senior Research Officer for the Department of Entomology, and the current acting Head of Department of Entomology at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI).
Photograph of Our Ugandan Team
Our Ugandan Team
Target Malaria Uganda’s research is supported by a dynamic team based at the Uganda Virus Research Institute in Entebbe. The team is dedicated to ensuring the research helps to reduce the burden of malaria across the country. Target Malaria employs a diverse team in Uganda including qualified insectary staff, scientists and an engagement and communication team committed to working closely with key stakeholders and communities around the insectary, village sites and at the national level to inform them about the research process and studies. The scientific team is mentoring students in PhDs and Master’s degrees for their contributing work in training and deepening the research in biology and biotechnologies.
Latest from Uganda
Communicating with communities through microprogrammes
Posted 1st March 2022
Effective communication is critical to Target Malaria’s work in engaging with the communities most affected by malaria. We have found…
Expédition de collecte de moustiques en Ouganda
Posted 13th January 2022
Le paludisme représente un lourd fardeau économique et sanitaire pour les communautés à travers l’Ouganda, dont 90 % de la…
Les jeunes scientifiques de Target Malaria partagent leur histoire personnelle et disent comment ils tirent un trait sur le paludisme
Posted 26th April 2021
La science nous permet de mieux comprendre la nature et d’appliquer les connaissances découlant de la recherche pour améliorer
Our Work
Target Malaria is an innovative project aiming to reduce the population of malaria-transmitting mosquitoes in sub-Saharan Africa. By reducing the population of malaria mosquitoes, we aim to reduce the transmission of the disease, allowing people in affected areas to live without the burden of malaria and freeing up resources currently used to combat the disease.
While there are more than 3,500 species of mosquito worldwide and 837 in Africa, only 3 very closely related species are responsible for most transmission of the disease: Anopheles gambiae, Anopheles coluzzii and Anopheles arabiensis.
We plan to tackle malaria at the source: the malaria mosquitoes.
Our strategy focuses on decreasing the number of female vector mosquitoes in a population because only females bite and their number usually determines future population size.
…
Our technology specifically targets these Anopheles species and so should not affect other types of mosquitoes or insects in the surrounding environment. Our approach is therefore malaria control by mosquito control.
Our approach
A step-by-step development pathway
–
Target Malaria is developing its innovative genetic technologies in a step-wise approach. Our phased development pathway follows the recommendations made by several expert groups, including the 2021 World Health Organisation (WHO) Guidance framework for testing of genetically modified mosquitoes (first and second editions), the 2016 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine report Gene Drives on the Horizon, and, most recently, the 2018 Pathway to Deployment of Gene Drive Mosquitoes as a Potential Biocontrol Tool for Elimination of Malaria in Sub-Saharan Africa: Recommendations of a Scientific Working Group.
Our research is still at an early stage, and even though results so far have been promising, we still have a long way ahead of us. Our aim is to develop genetic technologies for vector control for malaria that will be sustainable and cost-effective to implement, as the mosquitoes themselves will help to control malaria transmission.
How gene drive works
Currently, we are evaluating a number of approaches to reduce the number of malaria mosquitoes using genetic modification, in particular gene drive technologies. This work is still at an early stage, but our models indicate that this method has the potential to significantly reduce the numbers of malaria mosquitoes, and the transmission of malaria, within a socially relevant timeframe.
The goal of all of the gene drive approaches we are investigating is to produce genetically modified Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes that can pass a genetic modification on to a high percentage of their offspring, so the modification is established throughout the specific population relatively quickly and is effectively “self-sustaining”. The objective of the genetic modifications we are making is to reduce the number of female Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes because they are the ones who transmit malaria when they bite humans.
To do so, we are introducing genes that produce enzymes (called nucleases) into Anopheles gambiae. These enzymes recognise and cut very specific sequences of DNA. In Target Malaria’s case, our researchers precisely cut and therefore disrupt the specific gene sequences of interest to our researchers, such as fertility genes or sex determination genes that will impact reproduction and thus population size. This makes the reduction of the malaria mosquito population relatively cost-effective and sustainable to implement because the mosquitoes themselves do the work.
Two of the main areas we are currently focusing on are biasing the sex ratio of mosquito populations and reducing female fertility.
Target Malaria started as a university-based research programme and has grown to include scientists, stakeholder engagement teams, regulatory affairs experts, project management teams, risk assessment specialists and communications professionals from Africa, North America and Europe. Target Malaria receives core funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and from Open Philanthropy. Individual labs also received additional funding from a variety of sources to support each lab’s work, including but not limited to : the Department for Food Environment and Rural Affairs-DEFRA (UK), the European Commission, the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis (UK), the National Institutes of Health-NIH (USA), the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology-UNCST, Ugandan Ministry of Health, the Wellcome Trust (UK), and the World Bank.
Target Malaria’s vision is a world free of malaria.
We cannot win the fight against malaria alone and our aim is for the technology to be complementary to current malaria efforts. We aim to achieve excellence in all areas of our work, creating a path for responsible research and development of genetic technologies. We are co-developing both our technologies and the associated knowledge base as well as ensuring our work is evidence-driven so we can deliver safe and effective technologies to those who need it. We are committed to be open and accountable in our work, relationships and decisions.
Read our full Vision, Mission, Values Statement.
As a grantee from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Target Malaria follows the Global Access pledge. It means: (a) knowledge and information gained from the Project is promptly and broadly disseminated; and (b) the Funded Developments will be made available and accessible at an affordable price to people most in need within developing countries. Target Malaria also follows the Foundation’s Open Access Policy that enables the unrestricted access and reuse of all peer-reviewed published research funded, in whole or in part, by the foundation, including any underlying data sets.
Our teams are organised around ‘functions’, often working across multiple locations. Learn about the functions of our teams below:
The Science teams
The Stakeholder Engagement and Communications Team
The Regulatory Affairs Team
The Risk Team
The Project Management Team
Our Partner Institutions
Target Malaria's team in Uganda works in collaboration with the Uganda Virus Research Institue (UVRI), based in Entebbe and is headed by Dr. Jonathan Kayondo.
Context of our work
Uganda has one of the highest global burden of malaria cases, with over 90% of the population at risk, malaria remains Uganda’s leading cause of death, especially in children. The disease causes immense detrimental health effects and is responsible for 30 to 50% of outpatient visits and 15 to 20% of hospital admissions. The average economic loss in Uganda due to malaria annually is over $500 million. In 2020, WHO reported that there were an estimated 20,4 million malaria cases and over 30,900 estimated deaths in the country.
Target Malaria Uganda is hosted at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI). The institute engages in health research on human infections and disease processes associated with or linked to viral aetiology. Target Malaria Uganda is led by Dr. Jonathan Kayondo, who is the Senior Research Officer for the Department of Entomology, and the current acting Head of Department of Entomology at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI). Target Malaria activities fall under the Department of Entomology and Vector Biology, which focuses on the study of various arboviral vectors, especially yellow fever, dengue, chikungunya and malaria. The Division is involved in capacity building and provides advice on vector control to the Government of Uganda.
Target Malaria Uganda
Photograph of Jonathan Kayondo
Dr. Jonathan Kayondo
Target Malaria Uganda's Principal Investigator
Dr. Jonathan Kayondo is Principal Investigator for Target Malaria in Uganda. He is also Senior Research Officer for the Department of Entomology, and the current acting Head of Department of Entomology at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI).
Photograph of Our Ugandan Team
Our Ugandan Team
Target Malaria Uganda’s research is supported by a dynamic team based at the Uganda Virus Research Institute in Entebbe. The team is dedicated to ensuring the research helps to reduce the burden of malaria across the country. Target Malaria employs a diverse team in Uganda including qualified insectary staff, scientists and an engagement and communication team committed to working closely with key stakeholders and communities around the insectary, village sites and at the national level to inform them about the research process and studies. The scientific team is mentoring students in PhDs and Master’s degrees for their contributing work in training and deepening the research in biology and biotechnologies.
Latest from Uganda
Communicating with communities through microprogrammes
Posted 1st March 2022
Effective communication is critical to Target Malaria’s work in engaging with the communities most affected by malaria. We have found…
Expédition de collecte de moustiques en Ouganda
Posted 13th January 2022
Le paludisme représente un lourd fardeau économique et sanitaire pour les communautés à travers l’Ouganda, dont 90 % de la…
Les jeunes scientifiques de Target Malaria partagent leur histoire personnelle et disent comment ils tirent un trait sur le paludisme
Posted 26th April 2021
La science nous permet de mieux comprendre la nature et d’appliquer les connaissances découlant de la recherche pour améliorer
Our Work
Target Malaria is an innovative project aiming to reduce the population of malaria-transmitting mosquitoes in sub-Saharan Africa. By reducing the population of malaria mosquitoes, we aim to reduce the transmission of the disease, allowing people in affected areas to live without the burden of malaria and freeing up resources currently used to combat the disease.
While there are more than 3,500 species of mosquito worldwide and 837 in Africa, only 3 very closely related species are responsible for most transmission of the disease: Anopheles gambiae, Anopheles coluzzii and Anopheles arabiensis.
We plan to tackle malaria at the source: the malaria mosquitoes.
Our strategy focuses on decreasing the number of female vector mosquitoes in a population because only females bite and their number usually determines future population size.
…
Our technology specifically targets these Anopheles species and so should not affect other types of mosquitoes or insects in the surrounding environment. Our approach is therefore malaria control by mosquito control.
Our approach
A step-by-step development pathway
–
Target Malaria is developing its innovative genetic technologies in a step-wise approach. Our phased development pathway follows the recommendations made by several expert groups, including the 2021 World Health Organisation (WHO) Guidance framework for testing of genetically modified mosquitoes (first and second editions), the 2016 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine report Gene Drives on the Horizon, and, most recently, the 2018 Pathway to Deployment of Gene Drive Mosquitoes as a Potential Biocontrol Tool for Elimination of Malaria in Sub-Saharan Africa: Recommendations of a Scientific Working Group.
Our research is still at an early stage, and even though results so far have been promising, we still have a long way ahead of us. Our aim is to develop genetic technologies for vector control for malaria that will be sustainable and cost-effective to implement, as the mosquitoes themselves will help to control malaria transmission.
How gene drive works
Currently, we are evaluating a number of approaches to reduce the number of malaria mosquitoes using genetic modification, in particular gene drive technologies. This work is still at an early stage, but our models indicate that this method has the potential to significantly reduce the numbers of malaria mosquitoes, and the transmission of malaria, within a socially relevant timeframe.
The goal of all of the gene drive approaches we are investigating is to produce genetically modified Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes that can pass a genetic modification on to a high percentage of their offspring, so the modification is established throughout the specific population relatively quickly and is effectively “self-sustaining”. The objective of the genetic modifications we are making is to reduce the number of female Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes because they are the ones who transmit malaria when they bite humans.
To do so, we are introducing genes that produce enzymes (called nucleases) into Anopheles gambiae. These enzymes recognise and cut very specific sequences of DNA. In Target Malaria’s case, our researchers precisely cut and therefore disrupt the specific gene sequences of interest to our researchers, such as fertility genes or sex determination genes that will impact reproduction and thus population size. This makes the reduction of the malaria mosquito population relatively cost-effective and sustainable to implement because the mosquitoes themselves do the work.
Two of the main areas we are currently focusing on are biasing the sex ratio of mosquito populations and reducing female fertility.
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