"This is a great example of translating basic research expertise at UC Davis to help train an international graduate student who will go home and improve her country's quality of science, protect its environment, and solve a need of its agricultural industry," Last said.

The UC Davis Fogarty International Center's annual funding of about $150,000 comes from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) program of the same name.

The UC Davis center's activities currently involve three scientists at UC Davis in leadership roles and as many as a dozen more as training faculty, along with four scientists in three South American countries in leadership roles and about 12 more as training faculty, with several dozen South American trainees seeking advanced degrees.

Other successful projects in the UC Davis Fogarty Center's nine-year history include:

ELISAs for algal toxins in recreational and drinking water in Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru, which led to ongoing government-sponsored surveillance programs; ELISAs for antigens from the tapeworm Echinococcus, which are being used throughout South America for disease surveillance and epidemiological studies; An ELISA for a fecal (copro) antigen of Echinococcus, now a major component of a Gates Foundation-funded attempt to eradicate this parasite in Northern Peru; An ELISA now used in the bread-making industry in Uruguay to test for fungal toxins in wheat flour; Tests based on polymerase chain reactions, or PCR, to check drinking water quality in Argentina; PCR tests for H1N1 virus that were used for rapid diagnosis of swine flu during last winter's epidemic in northwest Argentina; and Graduate-level courses taught online ("distance learning") to support a new master's degree program in environmental toxicology in Argentina.

Source: University of California - Davis