UNZA-VANDERBILT PARTNERSHIP FOR HIV-NUTRITION RESEARCH TRAINING (UVP)

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 DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The UNZA-Vanderbilt Training Partnership for HIV-Nutrition-Metabolic Research (UVP) continues a longstanding training collaboration of the University of Zambia School of Medicine/University Teaching Hospital (UNZA/UTH) and Vanderbilt University (VU) and its Institute for Global Health (VIGH). With PEPFAR's successes turning HIV into a chronic condition, many Africans are living full lives with HIV, but they are facing non-communicable diseases that come with lifelong antiretroviral therapy (ART), lifestyle changes accompany- ing the epidemiologic transition, and aging. Nutritional factors are central to many of these, especially in low- income countries, affecting pathogenic processes in the gastrointestinal tract, kidneys, nervous system, and cardiovascular system. UNZA-VIGH collaborations have discovered multiple nutritional influences on ART outcomes. A recently completed large-scale HIV-nutrition clinical trial (NUSTART) has built large specimen and data repositories that are available for analyses and long-term follow-up studies. UNZA has identified PhD training as crucial for advancing its institutional research capacity and academic leadership. UVP will support this by training UNZA PhD-level HIV research leaders in nutritionally- and metabolically related complications and comorbidities of HIV, while expanding UNZA/UTH's research training and investigative capacities. UVP will provide long-term research training for advanced UNZA trainees and junior faculty members, leading to 11 "sandwich" PhD degrees awarded by UNZA and undergirded by Vanderbilt didactic courses, research mentorship, and institutional resources. It will support innovative multidisciplinary mentored dissertation research focused on the key metabolic and nutritional challenges in long-term HIV care. The UVP proposal is distinguished by a 17-year AITRP partnership that has enabled 41 Zambians to obtain advanced degrees (mainly Master's) and has substantially facilitated many US grant-funded education and training efforts described within (AITRP, MEPI, ZEPACT, FICRS-F, Fogarty GHF). UVP will enhance the UNZA PhD Program by conducting in-country consultations, skill-building short courses, and faculty development workshops to strengthen PhD mentoring standards and assess measureable milestones. It will provide career development opportunities for research-focused UNZA faculty members via 4-month VU-based postdoctoral sabbaticals, to expand research collaborations between UNZA and VU investigators and to attract extramural research funding. We will document the program's long-term success by tracking major trainee outputs; providing ongoing skill-building opportunities for our AITRP alumni; conducting regular program evaluations; and engaging our AITRP alumni as active in-country instructors in ongoing Zam- bia-based trainings. UVP will strengthen UNZA's capacity to train future researchers, attract extramural research funding, and generate high-impact research outputs in a vital HIV research arena. Sustainabil- ity will be maximized by mentoring future mentors within all UVP activities.