This month's Reddit IAmA in collaboration with eLife will feature Ellie Sherrard-Smith and Andrew Blagborough from Imperial College London, UK. They recently published the first evidence in animals that combining two different anti-malarial vaccines can significantly reduce the disease burden.
They will be answering questions from 4pm London (11am New York), July 19, on Reddit's r/IAmA platform at https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA.
From left to right: Andrew Blagborough and Ellie Sherrard-Smith.
Ellie Sherrard-Smith – Ellie is an epidemiologist, parasitologist and mathematical modeller focusing on infectious diseases. She is part of the malaria modelling group at Imperial. Specifically, she concentrates on the impact of transmission-blocking interventions (TBIs) and vaccines, as well as vector-control interventions against malaria. She also has a broader interest in host-parasite dynamics, how the distribution of parasites and exposure rates vary across the animal kingdom, and what factors govern where individuals fall in that distribution.
Andrew Blagborough – Andrew is a Principal Investigator at Imperial’s Department of Life Sciences. His main interests focus on the identification of novel anti-malarial TBIs and vaccine delivery. As part of his work, he develops assays to examine TBI efficacy and assess the practical impact of introducing TBIs on populations of mosquitoes and vertebrates – both in the laboratory and the field.
Ellie and Andrew will be answering questions about a recent paper published in eLife, where they showed that two experimental anti-malarial vaccines, which independently achieve 48% and 68% reductions in malaria cases, can achieve 91% reduction when combined. Their study was carried out using genetically altered mouse parasites that express the same proteins as those expressed on the human version of the malaria parasite. You can read the full paper here. A plain-language summary is also available here.
They are also happy to discuss their research more broadly. They'll both start answering questions at 11am EDT. Ask them anything!
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