Forum for Science, Industry and Business

U.S.-Ethiopian Effort Will Monitor Malaria Risk

Associate professor Michael Wimberly of South Dakota State University’s Geographic Information Science Center of Excellence said the work builds on SDSU’s experience using geospatial tools to study a different mosquito-borne illness in the United States. Wimberly and his SDSU colleagues have carried out several studies in recent years studying West Nile virus outbreaks in South Dakota and the surrounding region, where the virus that causes the disease is spread largely by a mosquito called Culex tarsalis.

Malaria is also a mosquito-borne disease. The parasite that causes the disease is spread by the bite of the female Anopheles mosquito. Malaria is found in about 109 countries in the Americas, Africa, and Asia. The World Health Organization estimated that as many as 1 million people died of malaria in 2008. Most fatalities are in children younger than 5. The vast majority of cases are in sub-Saharan Africa.

Wimberly said some of the techniques that SDSU geographers use to study West Nile virus can be deployed to also study malaria in Africa.

“Malaria is a major public health problem in Ethiopia, where outbreaks in highland regions can be affected by climatic variability, land use change, and seasonal movements of human populations,” Wimberly said. “We can apply geospatial technologies, including geographic information systems, or GIS, and satellite remote sensing to forecast the spatial and temporal patterns of malaria risk — where and when outbreaks are likely to occur.”

Wimberly said the plan depends on a multidisciplinary team that links scientists who have knowledge of geospatial data and techniques with public health practitioners who have a detailed understanding of local needs. Wimberly and his colleagues have developed such a partnership involving the Geographic Information Science Center of Excellence or GIScCE at South Dakota State University, the U.S. Geological Survey’s EROS Center in Sioux Falls, and the Anti-Malaria Association or AMA, a non-governmental organization located in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

“In this partnership, the role of the GIScCE is to develop models for ecological forecasting of malaria risk using satellite remote sensing, and the role of the AMA is to facilitate data collection, model validation, and implementation of the resulting products,” Wimberly said.

The partnership’s preliminary results have documented relationships between satellite-derived environmental metrics and malaria incidence in the Ethiopian highlands, confirming the feasibility of malaria risk mapping and forecasting.

“We have also developed other GIS data products related to land use, health facility accessibility, transportation, and population characteristics that may be useful for enhancing malaria prevention efforts,” Wimberly said. “A key technical challenge in Ethiopia has been implementing Internet-based mapping technologies in an environment of low connectivity and low bandwidth. Therefore, another important aspect of the partnership is developing effective, low-cost, and easy-to-use methods for providing public health practitioners with access to digital map products.”

The SDSU scientists’ latest visit to Ethiopia in summer 2010 has spawned a subproject that will focus on providing baseline geographic data to health centers in Ethiopia’s Amhara region.

“We’re going to pick 10 woreda, or districts, in the Amhara region and collaborate with a GIS consulting firm in Ethiopia to generate a number of paper map products for them,” Wimberly said. This low-tech exercise will help researchers learn what types of maps are most useful for malaria prevention and control.

The lessons learned and the tools developed through the ongoing collaboration between GIScCE and AMA can help to inform and enhance other global health partnership efforts, he added.

In addition to Wimberly, others involved in the project include Alemayehu Midekisa, Ting-Wu Chuang, and Geoffrey Henebry, all of the Geographic Information Science Center of Excellence at South Dakota State University; Gabriel Senay of the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science Center, or EROS Center, in Sioux Falls, S.D.; and Abere Mihretie and Paulos Semunigus, both of the Anti-Malaria Association, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Lance Nixon | Newswise Science News
Further information:
http://www.sdstate.edu

Im Focus: Can we see monkeys from space? Emerging technologies to map biodiversity

An international team of scientists has proposed a new multi-disciplinary approach in which an array of new technologies will allow us to map biodiversity and the risks that wildlife is facing at the scale of whole landscapes. The findings are published in Nature Ecology and Evolution. This international research is led by the Kunming Institute of Zoology from China, University of East Anglia, University of Leicester and the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research.

Using a combination of satellite and ground data, the team proposes that it is now possible to map biodiversity with an accuracy that has not been previously...

Im Focus: Climate satellite: Tracking methane with robust laser technology

Heatwaves in the Arctic, longer periods of vegetation in Europe, severe floods in West Africa – starting in 2021, scientists want to explore the emissions of the greenhouse gas methane with the German-French satellite MERLIN. This is made possible by a new robust laser system of the Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology ILT in Aachen, which achieves unprecedented measurement accuracy.

Methane is primarily the result of the decomposition of organic matter. The gas has a 25 times greater warming potential than carbon dioxide, but is not as...

Im Focus: How protons move through a fuel cell

Hydrogen is regarded as the energy source of the future: It is produced with solar power and can be used to generate heat and electricity in fuel cells. Empa researchers have now succeeded in decoding the movement of hydrogen ions in crystals – a key step towards more efficient energy conversion in the hydrogen industry of tomorrow.

As charge carriers, electrons and ions play the leading role in electrochemical energy storage devices and converters such as batteries and fuel cells. Proton...

Im Focus: A unique data centre for cosmological simulations

Scientists from the Excellence Cluster Universe at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich have establised "Cosmowebportal", a unique data centre for cosmological simulations located at the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre (LRZ) of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. The complete results of a series of large hydrodynamical cosmological simulations are available, with data volumes typically exceeding several hundred terabytes. Scientists worldwide can interactively explore these complex simulations via a web interface and directly access the results.

With current telescopes, scientists can observe our Universe’s galaxies and galaxy clusters and their distribution along an invisible cosmic web. From the...

Im Focus: Scientists develop molecular thermometer for contactless measurement using infrared light

Temperature measurements possible even on the smallest scale / Molecular ruby for use in material sciences, biology, and medicine

Chemists at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) in cooperation with researchers of the German Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM)...