APOLS is an Advanced Grant ERC project (2015), led by Etienne Pays (Molecular Parasitology Laboratory, Faculty of Sciences)

Etienne Pays is studying trypanosomes, a parasite causing sleeping sickness. In 1998, he discovered the gene allowing certain trypanasomes to get past the human body's immune defence mechanisms; in 2010, he discovered that a mutation of apolipoprotein-L1 allows some West African populations to resist these trypanosomes but that this evolutionary advantage is accompanied by a higher risk of kidney failure.
Thanks to the ERC, Etienne Pays will be able to investigate the evolutionary capabilities of this parasite, subjecting it to controlled and increasingly higher doses of mutated apoL1 - and thereby possibly opening the door to new ways of treating kidney failure.

End of the project: 31/08/2020
 

This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No 669007).

Dates
Created on August 9, 2018