SEEKING OUTSTANDING CANDIDATES FOR
Post-Doctorate and PhD Multi-Disciplinary Opportunities in Infectious Diseases and Public Health Research
Zambart is inviting applications for two post-doctorate and four PhD opportunities. Linked to different funders, and a fellowship network project/four cutting edge research projects, these fully funded post-doctorates and PhDs will be based at Zambart within either network consortiums and/or multi-country and regional research projects that encompass other sub-Saharan African higher education institutions (HEIs) and HEIs based in the Global North.
Disciplines underpinning the post-doctorate positions and PhDs include clinical science, epidemiology, health systems and social sciences. Research topics are broad with the following provided as examples: clinical or epidemiological studies in Tuberculosis (TB), HIV, sexual and reproductive health, and lung disease, health access for young mobile people, community engagement in public health research, stigma related to HIV and/or TB and the acceptability of using Artificial Intelligence in TB diagnosis.
Collectively, the opportunities aim to train and develop a new generation of skilled, innovative, world-class and resilient African researchers who will address existing and emerging research challenges in infectious diseases, working across variable contexts, professional and research disciplines, with equity as a core value.
The post-doctorate and PhD opportunities and essential applicant qualifications and the associated funders, collaborating institutions and research projects are detailed below.
Zambart Profile: Zambart is an independent Zambian research organization whose headquarters is at Ridgeway Campus in Lusaka. Zambart is globally renowned for its interdisciplinary research on HIV and Tuberculosis and has contributed to HIV and TB policy and practice at national, regional and global levels. Zambart’s research portfolio now includes a broader scope of urgent public health issues. One of Zambart’s key strategic pillars is capacity building.
Post-doctorates: The two post-doctorates will involve two-years of networking and skill building opportunities based at Zambart, and involve time spent at Ludwig-Maximillian University Munich (LMU) and/or the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), UK and other HEIs if necessary. The expectation is that the post-doctorates will house themselves within Zambart, aligning themselves with some key current grants in their area of interest, and through this opportunity, obtain a competitive fellowship or grant funding to establish them as independent research investigators. It is anticipated that one post-doctorate is for a clinical scientist or epidemiologist and one post-doctorate is for a health systems researcher and/or social scientist. Supervisors for the post-doctorates will be from Zambart and from LMU or LSHTM. The post-doctorate funding is from the EDCTP and is part of the fellowship network project Southern Africa Research Capacity Network (SOFAR) coordinated by LMU and LSHTM in partnership with three African institutions: the Biomedical Research and Training Institute in Zimbabwe, Zambart in Zambia, and Instituto Nacional de Saúde in Mozambique.
Post-doctorate Essential Eligibility Criteria
- A PhD degree in clinical science OR epidemiology OR social science OR health systems preferably focused on TB/HIV – completed within the last 3-5 years.
- Experience in conducting TB/HIV related public health research.
- Track record of successful grants as lead or co-lead.
- Experience in quantitative or qualitative research design and robust methods.
- Experience conducting research in and with communities.
- Fluent in English and at least one of the widely spoken Zambian languages is an added advantage.
- National of an African country.
- Applicants should be eligible to study or work in Zambia.
- Willing to continue working at Zambart as Senior Researchers contingent on funding.
PhDs: The four PhDs will involve registration at either the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa or the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), UK, dependent on the institutional collaboration of the grant they are housed within. Supervision will be provided across Zambart, Wits/LSHTM/LMU and other collaborating academic institutions. Applicants should hold strong research ambitions for a career in infectious disease and public health research linked to clinical science or epidemiology and/or health systems and/or social science. It is anticipated that one PhD will be in clinical science or epidemiology and three PhDs will be in social science and/or health systems. Each PhD will be linked to a specific research project grant, and the successful candidates will work with the wider research team of the project grant, developing a specific component for their PhD. The PhD is structured over a 3-year period. The PhD candidates will be expected to complete an upgrading process and have received ethical approval for their proposed research by 12 months of their PhD. Various training opportunities will be available to the PhD candidates to enable them to make significant career progress during the three years of their PhD.
The four research grants that could house PhD candidates are:
The Southern Africa Research Capacity Network (SOFAR):
The Southern Africa Research Capacity Network (SOFAR) will train and develop a new generation of African researchers, scientists, clinicians and other public health professionals, who will address existing and emerging challenges in infectious diseases, working across different settings, and research disciplines.
SOFAR will train PhD fellows in high quality and relevant infectious disease research combining taught content with practical experience. The research conducted by the fellows must be relevant, focusing on infectious diseases including poverty related diseases. The PhD fellows will benefit from being part of an excellent research team and a vibrant academic community setting. This will facilitate personal development, enhanced career opportunities, critical thinking and problems solving spaces. The fellowship is being facilitated by a partnership between two higher education institutions (HEIs) in Europe namely, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU), and three African Partner Research Institutions (APRIs) namely, Biomedical Research and Training Institute (Zimbabwe), Instituto Nacional de Saúde (Mozambique), and Zambart (Zambia). The SOFAR network is funded the EDCTP.
Nurture4Youth project:
PhD in social science. The research project is a Global Health Research Group working on nurturing the resilience of mobile youth to navigate health and wellbeing crises in Southern Africa. This project will address health access for young migrants by working with them in selected sites in South Africa and Zambia to co-create and test interventions that can improve their access to sexual and reproductive health services, responding to a demand from key stakeholders. The research team is a collaboration between LSHTM, the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Zambart, and the Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI). The successful applicant will be enrolled in a PhD in Migration & Displacement at the African Centre for Migration & Society (ACMS) at Wits University. This research and PhD are funded by the NIHR using UK aid from the UK Government to support global health research.
Expanded Total Facility Approach project:
PhD in social science and/or health systems. The expanded Total Facility Approach (eTFA) is an evidence-based HIV stigma and discrimination intervention being implemented in Zambia, Ghana and Tanzania within hospitals and health training institutions. The expanded TFA project has a monitoring and evaluation component that collects baseline, mid-line and end-line quantitative and qualitative data, and implementation science, health economics and stakeholder engagement data. The PhD will draw on the Zambian data collected as part of this monitoring and evaluation design. The data is both quantitative and qualitative, and the successful candidate would ideally be able to analyze mixed-methods data and do a mixed-methods PhD in HIV stigma and discrimination. This PhD is funded by the SOFAR network project, and the successful candidate will be registered at LSHTM, UK. The eTFA is led by Zambart in collaboration with Macha Research Trust, the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Zambia. Collaborating institutions outside of Zambia include Educational Assessment and Research Center (EARC), NACP and the Ghanian Nursing and Midwifery Council in Ghana; Muhimbili National Hospital (MNH) and Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS) in Tanzania, and the Research Triangle International (RTI) in the US and LSHTM in the UK. The project funding is from BMGF; the PhD funding is from EDCTP through the SOFAR network project.
POCUS4TB:
PhD in social science. This multi-disciplinary global research group is conducting research and building capacity for AI-assisted point-of-care ultrasound (AI-POCUS) for TB in four countries; Zambia, Mozambique, Bolivia and Peru. The research aims to investigate the barriers and enablers to deployment of POCUS, optimise acquisition protocols, understand the role in children, the training needs of operators and the potential role for monitoring of disease progression. A federated machine learning approach will be piloted to develop a prototype AI-POCUS. Alongside this automation the PhD research will conduct ethnographic and ethics research around the role of AI in health care, with a focus on this project but also contextualising this in the wider setting. The PhD will be based at Zambart and be conducted in Zambia and the candidate will be registered at LSHTM, UK. The research team is led by LSHTM, UK in collaboration with Zambart, CITAM-Plus, Asociacion Benefica PRISMA in Bolivia and Peru, Centro de Investigacao em Saude de Manhica (CISM) in Mozambique and Delf Imaging Systems B.V. in the Netherlands. This research and PhD are funded by the NIHR using UK aid from the UK Government to support global health research.
PhD Essential Eligibility Criteria
- Master of Science Degree (MSc) in clinical epidemiology preferably focused on TB/HIV – completed within the last 3- 5 years for the PhD in Epidemiology.
- Post-Graduate Diploma and/or Masters in social science and/or health systems completed within the last 3-5 years for the PhD in Social Science and/or Health Systems.
- Experience with research on one or more of the following topics: TB, HIV, migration, sexual and reproductive health, health-related stigma, community engagement, artificial intelligence and related topics.
- Experience in both qualitative and quantitative research design and methods.
- Experience conducting research in and with communities.
- Fluent in English and at least one of the widely spoken Zambian languages is an added advantage.
- National of an African country.
- Applicants should be eligible to study or work in Zambia.
- Experience in research coordination including obtaining ethical approvals, protocol writing and stakeholder engagement.
Application
Applicant Start Date: January 2025.
Interested candidates for both the post-doctorates and the PhDs must submit the following:
- Completed Application Form attached below
- Letter of Motivation (maximum 1 page)
- Supporting Letter from Academic Referee (maximum 1 page)
For any questions about eligibility please contact: Dr Musonda Simwinga at musonda@zambart.org.zm
Closing Date for Applications: 2 December 2024
Please send all filled forms, letter of motivation and the letter from academic referee to the Head of Human Resource, Zambart: jobs@zambart.org.zm.
Selection of Candidates
The application form is designed to assess the following 1) your career history to date, 2) your achievements in research to date, 3) your work experience in Zambia or countries in other Southern African countries, 4) how the opportunity will support your academic career development.
Applicants will be shortlisted by a multidisciplinary panel comprising senior research staff at Zambart, and a committee with membership drawn from HEIs and APRIs and other health professionals from research organisations in Zambia. All applicants who meet the application criteria will receive feedback, and those shortlisted will be invited for an interview by the same panel that conducted the shortlisting.
Shortlisted candidates will be invited for interviews either before the end of December 2024 or early in January 2025.
Successful candidate
Successful applicants will receive provisional confirmation of our intention to award them the PhD Fellowship funding. This does not mean that they have been accepted into the PhD programme Applicants must separately apply and be accepted to study at these universities.
The fellowship will cover fees, transport (air tickets), a stipend for three years and research costs.
How to apply
Please click on the following link: https://forms.office.com/r/2YibFTSBYw