So long, but not farewell

As many of you know, Professor Chris Plowe, the longtime Head of the WWARN Molecular Group has taken on a new responsibility as President of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in the USA.

Chris is one of the original founders of the WWARN, and since the early days of planning and developing the network, he has assured that molecular markers of antimalarial resistance have played a key role in WWARN’s activities. Together with Meera Venkatesan, former Molecular Group Coordinator, Chris directed the development of molecular tools and methods and worked with the community to assure that these were useful and accessible to all.  His long experience working in malaria endemic countries gave him the insights needed to integrate molecular analyses with clinical, pharmacological and in vitro studies, a major focus of WWARN in recent years.

Like all of our Group Heads, Chris has been a volunteer, balancing his WWARN responsibilities with academic responsibilities as Professor of Medicine, and Leader of the Malaria Group within the Center for Vaccine Development and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the University of Maryland. His intelligent direction, thoughtful diplomatic skills and calm manner have been critical in supporting WWARN’s development.  We will miss his leadership as a WWARN Molecular Group Head, but we are delighted that he intends to remain a supporter and contributor to WWARN as we move forward.   

Professor Chris Plowe comments, “I am very grateful to each of you for your partnership and friendship over the years, I look forward to continuing to contribute to WWARN in a non-leadership role, and to watching the continued evolution of WWARN over the years to come.”

With the advice of the Scientific Advisory Committee and the Board, we are considering how to build on Chris and Meera’s work and to develop more opportunities for cross-disciplinary research and Scientific Group integration to continually ensure that molecular data are ever more rapidly available to the wider malaria community. 

Antimalarial resistance, in particular artemisinin resistance, is an even greater threat to malaria control and elimination than when WWARN was first conceived with Chris. As a diverse but closely networked community of international research partners we are proud to support Chris in his new role as President of ASTMH in 2015.

This news update was written by Professor Carol Sibley, WWARN Scientific Director. Find out more about our Molecular Scientific Group, and please don’t hesitate to email us with your enquiries molecular@wwarn.org