CONTENTS 13TH H3AFRICA FELLOWS’ AGENDA ........................................................................................................................... 2 ABSTRACTS..................................................................................................................................................................... 7 BIOGRAPHIES .............................................................................................................................................................. 24 FELLOWS ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 24 TRAINERS .................................................................................................................................................................................... 30 ORGANIZING TEAM ................................................................................................................................................... 33 EMERGENCY NUMBERS ............................................................................................................................................. 34 SITE MAP ..................................................................................................................................................................... 35 NOTES ......................................................................................................................................................................... 36 1 | P a g e 13TH H3AFRICA FELLOWS’ AGENDA H3Africa Fellows Professional Development Workshop 7 -11 April 2019 Institute Pasteur de Tunis & Laico Hotel Tunis Tunisia DAY 1: 7 APRIL SCIENTIFIC WRITING AND PROMOTING RESEARCH VISIBILITY Institute Pasteur de Tunis, Tunisia Facilitators: Dr. Maria Kabbage &Hamza Dalleli 8:00 Bus departs Laico Hotel 8:30 – 8:45 Registration 8:45 – 9:00 Welcoming address 09:00 – 10:45 Dr. Sadri Znaidi How to write a research paper and get it published? 10:45 – 11:00 MORNING TEA/COFFEE BREAK 11:00 — 13:00 Dr. Sadri Znaidi How to write a research paper and get it published? 13:00– 14:00 LUNCH Dr Amel Ghouila How to increase visibility of research?, popular articles 14:00 – 15:00 Dr Rolanda Julius and social media platforms best practises Dr Amel Ghouila Applying for coveted positions or fellowships? A few 15:00 — 16:00 Mr Paballo Chauke tips for successful applications 16:00 — 16:15 AFTERNOON TEA/COFFEE BREAK 16:15 – 16:30 Closing and return to Laico Hotel TBA FELLOWS’ DINNER (Venue TBA) DAY 2: 8 APRIL GRANT WRITING Carthage, Laico Hotel Tunis National Institutes of Health African Academy of 08:00 – 12:30 Institutional overviews, lesson learned. Sciences Wellcome Trust H3Africa PI’s 12:30 – 12:50 LUNCH 12:50 – 13:30 Ambroise Wonkam Lessons learned Grant Writing Break-Out Session Escale, Laico Hotel Tunis Facilitators: Dr. Maria Kabbage, Maroua Boujemaa & Pr. Sonia Abdelhak Pr. Ikram Guizani 13:30 – 15:15 Applying for Career development grants Dr. Rym Kefi Pr. Ikram Guizani 15:15 — 16:15 Applying for Career development grants Dr. Rym Kefi 16:15 – 16:30 TEA/COFFEE AVAILABLE Pr. Ikram Guizani 16:30 – 17:00 Applying for Career development grants Dr. Rym Kefi Opening of the 13th Meeting of the H3Africa Consortium 19:00 – Cocktail Reception DAY 3: 9 APRIL PI & FELLOW PRESENTATIONS Carthage, Laico Hotel Tunis 07:00 – 08:00 Registration Anita Ghansah & Paulina Tindana 08:00 – 09:30 Joseph Ochieng PI presentations Rufus Olusola Akinyemi Jantina de Vries 2 | P a g e TEA/COFFEE BREAK/ POSTER SESSION Dhyafa Foyer The use of H3ABioNet node accreditation exercises in Melek Chaouch (Fellow) capacity building in Tunisia Pierre-Jean Laclide Benchmarking of RNAseq data analysis 09:30 – 09:50 (Fellow) Tunisians Youth Literacy to Seasonal Influenza: Foued Maaoui (Fellow) Antibiotics Versus Empathy Chandré Oosterwyk Investigating the microbiome profile in sickle cell (Fellow) disease patients in Cape Town PI & FELLOW PRESENTATIONS Infectious Disease Chair: Ayoade Oduola Project: Genomic Characterization and Surveillance of Microbial Threats in West Africa 09:50 – 10:20 Christian Happi (PI) 16 TBA minutes Q&A: 2 minutes Fehintola Ajogbasile (Fellow) 10 minutes Identification and Characterization of Yellow Fever Q&A: 2 minutes Virus (YFV) in VHF Suspected Samples by Genomics Deep Sequencing in Nigeria Project: TrypanoGEN +: The Genetic Determinants of Two Neglected Tropical 10:20 – 10:50 Diseases Enock Matovu TBA 25 minutes Q&A: 5 minutes Project: Center for Research on the Respiratory Microbiota of African Children (ReMAC) TBA 10:50 – 11:20 Mark Nicol (PI) 16 minutes Q&A: 2 minutes Prevalence and characterization of haemophilus Fadheela Patel (Fellow) influenzae in the nasopharynx of young children, South 10 minutes Q&A: 2 Africa minutes Project: SickleGenAfrica:Sickle Cell Disease Genomics 11:20 — 11:50 Network of Africa Solomon Ofori-Acquah 25 minutes Q&A: 5 TBA minutes 11:50 – 12:50 LUNCH (El Maeeda) FELLOW PRESENTATIONS Chair: Melek Chaouch 3 | P a g e Jean Tristan Brandenburg Prevalence, risk factors and genetic associations for 12:50 – 13:02 (PI: Ramsay) chronic kidney disease related variables in four sub- 10 minutes Q&A: 2 Saharan African countries: an AWI-Gen sub-study mins. Careen Naitore The developmentally dynamic microRNA transcriptome (PI: Masiga) 13:02 – 13:14 of Glossina pallidipes tsetse flies, vectors of sleeping 10 minutes Q&A: 2 sickness and animal trypanosomiasis minutes Monica Mbabazi (PI: Kateete) Sputum microbiome composition through treatment of 13:14 – 13:26 10 minutes Q&A: 2 TB patients in an endemic setting minutes Medhat Radi Bioinformatics analysis of nicotinic acetylcholine (PI: Mulder, Alzohairy) 13:26 — 13:38 receptor subunit α 8 (nAchra8) protein evolution in 10 minutes Q&A: 2 different higher and lower organisms minutes Noluthando Manyisa Whole Exome Sequencing reveals differential (PI: Wonkam) 13:38 — 13:50 frequencies in ancestral alleles in Hearing Impairment 10 minutes Q&A: 2 genes among patients compared controls in Cameroon minutes TEA/COFFEE BREAK/ POSTER SESSION Dhyafa Foyer BRCA1-c.211dupA a recent founder mutation in Najah Mighri (Fellow) Tunisian breast cancer patients: implication on clinical management and early disease detection Pleiotropic effects of molecular and cellular factors in 13:50 — 14:10 Imen Moumni (Fellow) sickle cell anemia Multidisciplinary investigation of rare genetic diseases Lilia Romdhane (Fellow) in Tunisia Hydroxyurea-induced miRNA expression in Sickle Cell Khutala Mnika (Fellow) Disease patients in Africa PI & FELLOW PRESENTATIONS Chair: Rex Chisholm Alash’le Abimiku 14:10 — 16:40 Clement Adebamowo PI presentations Zane Lombard Project: Immunoglobulin gene diversity in an African population and impact on antibody function in HIV infection Simone Richardson 16:40 — 17:10 16 minutes Q&A 2 minutes Simone Richardson Allelic variation in African immunoglobulin genes (Fellow) impacts on antibody function in HIV infection (PI: Lynn Morris) 10 minutes Q&A: 2 minutes 17:10 — 17:40 Dan Stein PI presentation DINNER (The Bridge Restaurant) DAY 4: 10 APRIL PI & FELLOW PRESENTATIONS 4 | P a g e Carthage, Laico Hotel Tunis 8:00 — 8:50 Samantha Nicolson Keynote address PI & FELLOW PRESENTIONS Chair: Phillip Awadalla Nicola Mulder 8:50 — 9:40 Nicola Mulder PI presentations Daudi Jjingo Maroua Boujemaa (PI: Alia Benkhala) Contribution of Germline Copy Number Variations to 9:40 — 9:52 10 minutes Q&A: 2 hereditary breast cancer in Tunisian Population minutes 9:52 — 10:10 Rolanda Julius Presentation TEA/COFFEE BREAK/ POSTER SESSION Dhyafa Foyer Effect of Vitamin D Binding Protein Gene Polymorphism Ester Acen (Fellow) and Vitamin D Bioavailability on Cathelicidin Expression in Tuberculosis Infection and Disease The importance of considering natural isotopes in Sara El Jadid (Fellow) improving protein identification accuracy 10:10 — 11:00 Metagenomic analysis of blood samples obtained from Judith Oguzie (Fellow) febrile patients in Nigeria H3Africa/GSK ADME: High throughput analysis of ADME Houcemeddine Othman pharmacogenomic variants at genomic and protein (Fellow) levels in African populations MultiOmeSEQ: A suite of tools for integrated analysis of Alfred Ssekagiri (Fellow) multi-level omics datasets OUTREACH & FELLOWS PRESENTATIONS Chair: Francine Ntoumi Science Shop as a tool for participatory research. The Hichem Ben Hassine 11:00 — 11:15 experience of Institut Pasteur de Tunis in the context of the H2020 InSPIRES Q&A 2 min Social and scientific engagement of young Tunisian 11:15 — 11:30 Maria Kabbage researchers: the experience of AJC-IPT Q&A 2 min Mariem Hanachi Genomic characteristics of Invasive Streptococcus 11:30 — 11:42 (PI: Aliah Benkahla) pneumoniae serotype 1 in New Caledonia, a region in 10 min Q&A 2 min Oceania with a high incidence of serotype 1 outbreaks Hamza Dalleli (PI: Alia Benkhala) Targeted Next Generation Sequencing applied for the 11:42 — 11:54 10 minutes Q&A: 2 molecular characterization of MODY patients in Tunisia minutes 11:54 — 12:10 Prof Ferrand Presentation 12:10 —12:25 Dr Jennifer Troyer Presentation 12:25—13:10 Drama of DNA Production 13:10 — 14:00 LUNCH FELLOWS’ SPEED PRESENTATIONS Cyrene, Laico Hotel Tunis Chair: Dr Maria Kabbage Facilitators: Dr. Najla Kharrat, Meriem Fassatoui, Cyrine Bouabid, & Verena Ras Investigating Genetic Markers of Autosomal Recessive 14:05 — 14:08 Elvis Twumasi Aboagye Non-Syndromic Hearing Impairment in Ghana Design and validation of Human Papillomavirus