Things are going well!

Jess & I are now feeling acclimatized to our new surroundings, and things here are going great. The campus where we are living is incredible; it is an oasis of manicured lawns, incredible flora, huge pastures (for the cows), and all the amenities (restaurant, bar, squash, tennis, pool, etc). Not what we were expecting! The odd bit is that we are absolutely surrounded by some of the more extreme shanty towns that I've encountered in my travels. It's a strange dichotomy. The campus is surrounded by large fences, and there are guards everywhere. Very strange, yet right now I'm sitting in my room (with internet hookup) with the patio door wide open, there's some people having a picnic on our front lawn, and I have to say that it is nice to feel safe.

I think I’ll use this opportunity to mention a little bit about the group that I’m working for here in Nairobi. ILRI (the International Livestock Research Institute) is a non-governmental organization which describes itself as working at “the crossroads of livestock and poverty.” Its mission is to “bring high-quality science and capacity-building to bear on poverty reduction and sustainable development for poor livestock keepers and their communities”. The group works in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean; and has partnerships and alliances with other organizations, national and international, in livestock research, training and information. Why livestock research for the poor? From the ILRI website:

“Farm animals are an ancient, vital and renewable natural resource. Throughout the developing world, they are means for hundreds of millions of people to escape absolute poverty. Livestock in developing countries contribute up to 80 percent of agricultural GDP; some 600 million rural poor people rely to a significant extent on livestock for their livelihoods.”

ILRI has five themes – or areas of focus – in order to address the severe constraints to livestock production in poor countries. My position here fits under theme 4: Biotechnology.

A bit of background: In Victoria I was spending one or two days a week in the lab of Dr. Terry Pearson. Terry’s lab does work on African trypanosomes, which are parasites that can cause trypanosomiasis. Trypanosomiasis has two main forms: 1) human trypanosomiasis (African sleeping sickness) and 2) animal trypanosomiasis (often called ‘nagana’ in vertebrate animals). The primary focus in Terry’s lab is on the cell surface molecules of trypanosomes, with a principal goal of providing information about several trypanosome antigens which may potentially be used to devise diagnostic tests for African sleeping sickness.

The work that I will be doing here is somewhat related, but more to do with the host-pathogen interaction that occurs during trypanosomal infection. In addition there is more of a focus on what is occurring on the genetic level. I’ll also be looking primarily at the animal form of trypanosomiasis, which accounts for why I’m at a livestock institute!

The first project that I’ve been assigned to is an investigation into the role of endotoxins in pathology following T. congolense infection in mice and cattle. In plain English, does the infected host (mice or cow) have bacterial toxins in its blood following trypanosome infection, and what effect does this have on the host-pathogen interaction and the infection itself?

Well, I’ve probably lost about 90% of readers by now, so I think I’ll move away from the science and back to how things are going with Jess & I!

The setup here is very good for meeting lots of people -- locals, and visiting scientists alike -- since everything here is self-contained (i.e. a lot of the people live on the campus so it almost has a 'resort' feel to it). The scientists are from all over; I haven't met two from the same country yet. The lab I work in has about 8 people, headed up by an immunogeneticist out of the University of Liverpool.

Since we have arrived here, we have had quite a few happy surprises. First was that our accommodations exceeded our expectations greatly, and that their cost was being covered by the project that I’m working for. Second, was that instead of just being a lowly intern, I will actually be under contract with ILRI as a “visiting scientist”, which I would assume entails greater responsibilities and should be even better experience than I anticipated. Third, after meeting one of the evolutionary biologists here it appears that Jessica may have a job working in the parisitology lab as well (I’ll let her tell you about it – she had her first day today). Above all, we have been overwhelmed with the warmth and friendliness of everyone we have met – especially the locals that we have encountered on campus, and also in our ventures into Nairobi, and the surrounding area.

Did I mention the desk they gave me has a view of Mt. Kilimanjaro on a clear day?

Anyway, our goal (other than brushing up on a lot of biochemistry!) for the next week is to get a car. I will be posting about it once we find our new steed. I’m hoping for a Toyota or Mitsubishi 4x4, but our vehicle budget is not huge, and we may have to settle for something a little smaller here or older.

I still haven't managed to post video yet unfortunately. The connection here is somewhat faster than dial-up, but not as fast as broadband. My video uploads will get to 60% and then just stall out. Looking into other ways of tranferring files, and hopefully with have something sussed out soon!