Medical Research Council Centre for Medical Mycology

真菌对全球健康有重大影响。这些微生物每年感染数十亿人，真菌疾病的全球死亡率与结核病和疟疾的死亡率相当，甚至更高。尽管它们造成高死亡率和健康损失，但真菌对人类健康的巨大影响尚未得到广泛认识，与其他疾病相比，真菌感染仍未得到充分研究。此外，我们正在发现导致危及生命的感染的新真菌物种，并了解到真菌可以加重其他严重感染，如流感或covid - 19。迫切需要在这个领域进行更多的研究。如果我们要成功地对抗真菌感染，有三个优先事项需要紧急关注。(i)我们需要提高检测病人真菌感染的能力。（ii）我们需要更明智地使用现有药物，并生产改进的抗真菌药物（特别是为了克服令人担忧的耐药性增加）。（三）我们需要加强对真菌如何引起疾病以及我们的免疫系统如何对抗这些感染的理解，使我们能够利用这些知识开发新的治疗方法。重要的是，在这一领域工作的科学家和医生在世界范围内短缺，这是阻碍我们应对这些挑战的能力的主要因素。医学研究理事会医学真菌学中心（医学真菌学中心）正在迎接这一全球挑战，其方法是开展跨学科研究，在真菌感染严重的世界中低收入地区建立国际单位，并通过培训下一代科学家和医生来提高能力。我们还在科学界和医学界以及公众中提高对真菌病管理的认识并影响政策。自2016年在阿伯丁推出并于2019年搬迁到埃克塞特以来，MRC CMM已经大幅增长。我们已在非洲设立了一个卫星站点（开普敦的非洲股），并将在南美洲（巴西）和亚洲（待定）设立类似的股。这些单位的目标是促进与这些地理区域有关的真菌病的研究和培训。通过我们的MRC中心及其卫星单位，我们将通过一项针对主要受众的雄心勃勃的参与方案，提高对真菌病和我们活动的认识。在下一个五年期，我们将招聘两名杰出的科学家，他们将加强和扩大中心在关键领域的广泛和互补的专业知识。我们的研究将集中在五个令人兴奋的跨学科主题，以解决该领域面临的主要挑战。MRC CMM的一个关键目标是通过我们世界领先的培训计划，培养一批优秀的研究人员，从而提高英国和全球医学真菌学的能力。这将包括一个定制的硕士-博士课程，将为15名学生提供广泛的跨学科培训，这是其他地方无法提供的；2个早期职业奖学金，为杰出人士在医学真菌学方面的独立研究提供快速通道；为希望在医学真菌学领域从事临床学术事业的优秀临床医生提供3个博士奖学金；为医科学生提供10个夏季奖学金，以激发他们对学术和医学真菌学的兴趣；并通过我们的国际单位，通过当地资助的学生和研究金、双边交流、讲习班和培训课程，促进低收入和中等收入国家的医学真菌学培训。这些研究员、博士生和临床实习生将促进中心内外的整合，并帮助我们开展创新的跨学科研究项目。重要的是，这些人提供的能力的提高将大大促进我们今后对付这些毁灭性疾病的能力。

Fungi have a major impact on global health. These organisms infect billions of people annually, and global mortality figures for fungal diseases rival or exceed those for tuberculosis and malaria. Despite the high rates of death and the loss of health they cause, the enormous impact of fungi on human health is not widely appreciated, and fungal infections remain understudied compared with other diseases. Moreover, we are discovering new fungal species that cause life threatening infections, and learning that fungi can aggravate other serious infections, such as influenza or COVID19. There is a pressing need for more research in this field. There are three priorities that require urgent attention if we are to successfully combat fungal infections. (i) We need to improve our ability to detect fungal infections in patients. (ii) We need to use our existing drugs more wisely and to generate improved antifungal drugs (especially to overcome a worrying increase in drug resistance). (iii) We need to enhance the understanding of how fungi cause disease and how our immune system combats these infections, to enable us to exploit this knowledge for novel therapies. Importantly, there is a world-wide shortage of scientists and doctors who are working in this field, and this is the main factor hindering our ability to tackle these challenges.The Medical Research Council Centre for Medical Mycology (MRC CMM) is meeting this global challenge by pioneering interdisciplinary research, establishing international units in low and middle income regions of the world that suffer high burdens of fungal infections, and increasing capacity by training the next generation of scientists and doctors. We are also raising awareness and influencing policy regarding the management of fungal diseases within the scientific and medical communities, and the general public. Since its launch in Aberdeen in 2016, and relocation to Exeter in 2019, the MRC CMM has grown considerably. We have established a satellite site in Africa (the AFGrica Unit in Cape Town) and will establish similar Units in South America (Brazil) and in Asia (tbc). The objectives of these Units are to promote research and training in fungal diseases relevant to those geographic regions. Through our MRC Centre and its satellite Units, we will promote awareness of fungal disease and of our activities through an ambitious programme of engagement that targets key audiences.During the next quinquennium we will recruit two outstanding scientists who will enhance and expand the Centre's broad and complementary expertise in key areas. Our research will be focussed into five exciting and interdisciplinary themes that address major challenges facing this field. A key objective of the MRC CMM is to increase capacity in medical mycology in the UK and globally by delivering an outstanding cohort of researchers through our world leading training programmes. This will include a bespoke MRes-PhD programme that will provide 15 students with a broad interdisciplinary training that is not available anywhere else; 2 Early Career Fellowships to fast-track an independent research career in medical mycology for exceptional individuals; 3 PhD Fellowships for excellent clinicians wishing to pursue a clinical academic career in medical mycology; 10 summer scholarships for medical students, to stimulate their interest in academia and in medical mycology; and to promote training in medical mycology in low and middle income countries through our International Units via locally funded Studentships and Fellowships, bilateral exchanges, workshops and training courses. These Fellows, PhD students and clinical trainees will foster integration across the Centre and beyond, and help enable our innovative interdisciplinary research programmes. Importantly, the increased capacity offered by these individuals will greatly facilitate our ability to tackle these devastating diseases in the future.