DrAlly Ibrahim Olotu

Dr Ally Olotu is research physician with expertise in malaria epidemiology and clinical trials addressing malaria interventions such as malaria vaccines. After 2 years of clinical practice at Aga Khan Hospital in Dar es salaam, Tanzania he worked as a research clinician within several clinical studies of malaria pathogenesis at KEMRI-Wellcome Trust, Kenya. In 2005, he was awarded a WHO/TDR Career Development Fellowship in malaria vaccine development and spent a year at GSK Biologicals in Rixensart, Belgium where he received training in malaria vaccine research and development and clinical trials management. He was also involved in coordinating two malaria vaccine trials in West Africa and played a role in the development of clinical trial protocols and standard operating procedures. He was a Co-PI in a multi-center trial evaluating the safety and efficacy of a candidate malaria vaccine RTS,S/AS01, in Kenya and Tanzania, and participated in setting up a clinical trial facility which provided support to the trial in Kenya. After the end of the industry-sponsored study in 2010, he initiated an investigator-led extension which formed the basis of his DPhil work on the Long term efficacy of a Pre-erythrocytic malaria vaccine and epidemiology of malaria which was completed in 2014. In 2015, He joined the Ifakara Health Institute and worked with Equatorial Guinea Malaria Vaccine Initiative research project in Malabo, Bioko Island as a lead investigator. Over the last 2 years, and working with both the public and private partners, he participated in the development of the protocols and SOPs for a whole sporozoite vaccine trial and trained a clinical trial team which successfully implemented the first ever clinical trial in the history of Equatorial Guinea. His main contribution has been on the investigation of the long-term efficacy of a candidate malaria vaccine (RTS,S/AS01) in young children living in a malaria endemic country. He has described the interaction between the vaccine efficacy and malaria exposure and studied immunological markers of vaccine efficacy and of naturally-acquired infection. His research to-date has led to several publication in peer reviewed journals. In 2013 he won the Oxford University Nuffield Department of Medicine Graduate Research Prize for his DPhil work. He is currently collaborating with Oxford University, Sanaria Inc, and Swiss Tropical Public Health Institute.