Cash boost for disease research

Dundee University has been given £13.6 million to fund research into some of the world’s most devastating diseases, including malaria and tuberculosis.

It has been given the money by medical charity Wellcome to create a new Wellcome Centre for Anti-Infectives (CAIR).

The centre will build upon research carried out at the university’s school of life sciences to create new drugs to treat neglected tropical diseases such as malaria and leishmaniasis, a disease caused by the bite of sandflies that causes agonising ulcers.

These diseases cause hundreds of thousands of deaths every year, disproportionately affect the poor and cost developing economies billions of dollars.

“This is a major boost from Wellcome for our research at Dundee, and will allow us to grow our capacity in drug discovery and development for neglected diseases,” said CAIR director Professor Paul Wyatt.

“It will also mean we can expand our international collaborations, catalyse new projects and provide resources to carry out drug discovery training for scientists from countries where these diseases are endemic.”

Last year researchers in the Drug Discovery Unit at Dundee announced the discovery of a new antimalarial compound with the potential to treat malaria patients in a single dose. It is now in clinical development.

The latest award is part of a £118m investment in research centres over the next five years.