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Paolo Denti is a professor of pharmacometrics in the Division of Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Cape Town.
His work focuses mainly on tuberculosis, HIV, and malaria and involves the use of mathematical models to characterize the relationship between drug dose, concentration, and response, while quantifying the effect of patient characteristics, trial information, and other factors on this relationship.
Overall, he aims to achieve a quantitative understanding of how these drugs work, so that we can suggest dose adjustments for treatment optimization and individualization, particularly needed for neglected populations, such as Paediatrics and pregnancy.
Research Officer, Division of Clinical Pharmacology, University of Cape Town, South Africa
PhD in Clinical Pharmacology (University of Cape Town, South Africa), MSc in biostatistics (University of Zimbabwe & Hasselt University, Belgium)
Honorary senior lecturer of biostatistics at Stellenbosch University, South Africa
Research focus: application of modelling and simulation techniques to optimise treatment of infectious diseases
Goonaseelan (Colin) Pillai is committed to driving programs that develop scientific capability in low and middle-income countries.
A clinical pharmacologist who trained in Durban, South Africa, Colin previously worked at the corporate headquarters of Novartis and Roche in Switzerland. He has a specialist interest in the application of non-linear mixed effects models to pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic data across a wide range of therapeutic areas.
In Pharma, he played leadership roles in bringing internal and external acceptance of applying mathematical models to decision making in drug development. His most recent Pharma role involved establishing programs that allowed sharing scientific expertise and infrastructure with researchers and institutions in LMIC.
Colin has held teaching, research and management positions at the Universities of Durban-Westville and Witwatersrand. He acquired his clinical and research experience in hospital and community pharmacy and as a consultant with the SA Medical Research Council’s Tuberculosis Research program, where he ran a unit conducting Phase 1 clinical trials. Colin continues to maintain active academic links with numerous institutions in Africa including via formal Honorary Professorships and Board Member status. Since November 2017, he is a Senior Advisor on capacity development and training programs for global health to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Dr. Chaba is currently the Academic Director at the Strathmore Institute of Mathematical Science, Strathmore University. She has over 8 years’ experience as a lecturer teaching both undergraduate and postgraduate students probability and statistics courses. She also heads statistical advisory unit where she facilitates training of statistical data analysis short course to participants from different fields.
Dr. Chaba obtained her Bachelors of Science degree in Statistics (2008), a Master’s of Science degree in Biometry (2011) from the University of Nairobi and a Ph.D. in Biostatistics (2017) from Strathmore University.
She is passionate about development and application of statistical methods to solve practical problems in different application fields. Her major research focus has been in the application of statistical methods in genomics but currently pursuing her interest in pharmacometrics.
She currently serves as a reviewer for the journal of BMC Medical Research Methodology and a member of the Strathmore Institutional Research Ethics review committee.
Prior to joining Strathmore University, Dr. Chaba worked at the Kenya Medical Research Institute/University of Washington project as a statistician and data-IT coordinator analyzing clinical trials data and coordinating all data and IT related activities.
Dr. Anthony Afum-Adjei Awuah is a postdoctoral research fellow with the Global Health and Infectious Disease Research Group at the Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research in Tropical Medicine (KCCR) and a former WHO/TDR Clinical Research and Development fellow.
Anthony started his career with a degree in Biochemistry and went on to do his PhD in Immunology, both at KNUST.
After his PhD, he did a postdoc at KCCR where he developed means to improve the use of interferon gamma release assay (IGRA) to diagnose TB in children, he also did a postdoc at Centre Muraz in Burkina through the West Africa Health Research Network, training in clinical research and worked with hidden population who are at a higher risk for HIV/AIDS.
He did another postdoc in vaccinology and vaccine trials at the GSK vaccine s.r.l in Siena, Italy.
He was part of the 2017 cohort of the Next Generation Scientist program to train young emerging scientists in clinical research at the headquarters of Novartis Pharma in Basel. He has extensive experience in GCP and clinical trials training.
His research areas include; infectious diseases, immunology, vaccinology and clinical research.
Adeniyi Olagunju is a Senior Lecturer, a Wellcome Trust Fellow and an Affiliate of the African Academy of Sciences, Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria, and Honorary Associate, University of Liverpool, UK.
Adeniyi holds a Bachelor of Pharmacy degree from Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria, MRes Biomedical Sciences & Translational Medicine, and a PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Liverpool, UK.
His primary research interest is infectious diseases pharmacology, with a focus on special populations, including pregnant women.
He has more than 8 years of teaching and research experience combined with over 10 years as a licensed Pharmacist in Nigeria.
Project Manager
Aida is a pharmacist from Uganda with a Master’s degree in mathematical modeling of drug effects. She is currently pursuing her doctoral studies in pharmacometrics at the University of Cape Town. Her studies focus on the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of dolutegravir, a new anti-retroviral agent.
Aida has previously applied modelling and simulation techniques to study efavirenz central nervous system side effects in African patients, as well as the dosing of a novel monoclonal antibody in a drug development setting. She has hands-on clinical research experience over several years as study pharmacist and project manager at a sickle cell disease clinic in Uganda.
Aida’s current role as program manager for Pharmacometrics Africa, oversees a comprehensive capacity development program in the field of quantitative clinical pharmacology on the African continent. This work expands on the training efforts she has been involved with at Makerere University, Uganda.
Lecturer in Cancer Pharmacometrics, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
PhD in Pharmacometrics, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
15 years of teaching and research experience at the Centre for Applied Pharmacokinetic Research, University of Manchester
Research interest: development of mechanistic models for PK and PD data, optimal design and sample size calculations, computer aided clinical trial simulation, dose optimization and longitudinal tumour size and survival data modelling in oncology
A preclinical Drug Metabolism and Pharmacokinetics (DMPK) scientist with research focus in the area of antiparasitic drugs and neglected diseases with more than 10 years’ experience.
Obtained a bachelor’s in Biochemistry and a master’s degree in Biotechnology from the University of Zimbabwe. She then received her PhD from the University of Cape Town, South Africa.
Besides her research, Roslyn has supported many clinical trials and preclinical projects with bioanalysis on either the HPLC or mass spectrometer.
She led a team that set-up the first DNA testing centre in Zimbabwe at the African Institute of Biomedical Science and Technology.
Other notable achievements include the set- up of the state-of-the-art bioanalytical laboratory and ADME toolkit for screening new drug candidates for safety and ADME liabilities, again the first of its kind in Zimbabwe.
Roslyn is a recipient of the Global Health and Equity Scholars fellowship where she received a grant to support her research on the safety and efficacy of praziquantel when co-administered with antiretroviral drugs, and the implications on mass drug administration programs. She also received a supporting grant from The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) for the same study.
Kamunkhwala is a PhD Student in the clinical pharmacology division at the University of Cape Town, South Africa.
She holds a master’s degree in Biostatistics and a bachelor’s degree of science in statistics and mathematics from the University of Malawi, Chancellor College. Her interest in pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics emerged from her master’s thesis work where she developed a model characterizing drug induced QT/QTC in children with severe malaria anaemia receiving artemether-lumefantrine preceded by quinine.
She now works on applying nonlinear mixed-effects modelling to characterize and overcome drug-drug interactions between antiretroviral and anti-tubercular treatment.
Edmund Ekuadzi has been lecturer in Pharmacognosy and Head of the Central Lab at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Ghana since December 2013 and September 2018 respectively.
Edmund obtained both his Bachelor of Pharmacy and PhD Pharmacognosy degrees from the KNUST. He is a Visiting Research Scholar of the Welcome Center for Anti-infective Research, Drug Discovery Unit of the University of Dundee as well as a Fellow of the Next Generation Scientists programme, 2012 of the Novartis Institute for Biomedical Research, Basel, Switzerland.
His research focuses on identifying new drug candidates or new leads from natural origin and control their quality. Edmund’s work was has been featured in news. See here and here=
Edmund is a pharmacist and immediate past Chairperson of the Ashanti region branch of the Pharmaceutical Society of Ghana and is an executive member of the Ghana Young Academy.
Ahmed Abulfathi is a consultant clinical pharmacologist and PhD candidate at Stellenbosch University, Cape Town, South Africa
Over 5-year experience in Clinical Pharmacology, Medicine and clinical research including clinical trials in South Africa
6-year experience of teaching both undergraduate and postgraduate health sciences students
Former member of the Stellenbosch University Health Research Ethics Committee.
Pius Fasinu is an Assistant Professor of Pharmacology, Campbell University College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, Campbell University, NC, USA
PhD in Clinical Pharmacology, Stellenbosch, South Africa
10 years of teaching and research experience from Universities of Witwatersrand, Stellenbosch and Mississippi
15 years of cumulative experience as a licensed Pharmacist in Nigeria and United States
Scientific focus on Drug Metabolism and Pharmacokinetics (DMPK), Pharmacogenomics and Pharmacometrics.
Dr. Omondi is currently a Lecturer at the Strathmore Institute of Mathematical Science, Strathmore University. He has over 3 years’ experience as a lecturer teaching both undergraduate and postgraduate students probability and statistics courses. He is also a member of the statistical advisory unit where he facilitates training of statistical data analysis short courses to participants from different fields.
Dr. Omondi obtained his Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Statistics with computing (2013) from University of Eldoret, a Master of Science degree in Mathematical Sciences (2015) from African Institute of Mathematical Sciences (AIMS- South Africa)/Stellenbosch University, a Master of Science degree in Mathematics (2016) from Stellenbosch University and a Ph.D. in Mathematical Biology (2020) from Strathmore University.
He is passionate about science, with strong technical, business, and interpersonal skills for working in a team and successfully completing a project. His major research focus is on mathematical modelling of infectious diseases.
He currently serves as a reviewer for the Journal of Applied Mathematics and Computation – Elsevier, International Journal of Applied and Computational Mathematics – Springer, Journal of Applied Mathematics – Hindawi, Letters in Biomathematics – Taylor & Francis, Octa Biotheoretica – Springer and BMJ Global Health – BMJ Specialist Journals.
Prior to joining Strathmore University, Dr. Omondi worked at the Absa Bank-Kenya as a Customer service advisor.
Catriona Waitt is a Reader (Associate Professor) in Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Liverpool, a Wellcome clinical research career development fellow based at the Infectious Diseases Institute, Makerere University College of Health Sciences, and an honorary Consultant in Acute Medicine at the Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
Research theme surrounds drug dosing and safety in pregnancy and breastfeeding, and other ‘difficult to study’ populations.
Clinical trials and observational studies with an emphasis on pharmacometrics to maximise efficient study design and interpretation of data, together with engagement activities at stakeholder and community level.
Post-doctoral fellow at the center for translational medicine, University of Maryland, Baltimore
PhD in Clinical Pharmacology (Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm-Sweden), Bachelor of Pharmacy (University of Dar es salaam, Tanzania)
7 years of pharmacology teaching and research experience at Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, Dar es salaam,Tanzania.
Research interest: optimize drug therapy and drug development through innovative mathematical modeling and simulations, post-market surveillance of generic drug substitutability
Previous research experience includes bioanalytical methods development, bioequivalence, pharmacogenetics and pharmacokinetic aspects of drug-drug interactions in treatments of HIV, TB and Malaria