H3Africa: a tipping point for a revolution in bioinformatics, genomics and health research in Africa.
BACKGROUND
A multi-million dollar research initiative involving the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Wellcome Trust and African scientists has been launched. The initiative, referred to as H3Africa, is an acronym that stands for Human Heredity and Health in Africa. Here, we outline what this initiative is set to achieve and the latest commitments of the key players as at October 2013.


RESULTS
The initiative has so far been awarded over $74 million in research grants. During the first set of awards announced in 2012, the NIH granted $5 million a year for a period of five years, while the Wellcome Trust doled out at least $12 million over the period to the research consortium. This was in addition to Wellcome Trust's provision of administrative support, scientific consultation and advanced training, all in collaboration with the African Society for Human Genetics. In addition, during the second set of awards announced in October 2013, the NIH awarded to the laudable initiative 10 new grants of up to $17 million over the next four years.


CONCLUSIONS
H3Africa is poised to transform the face of research in genomics, bioinformatics and health in Africa. The capacity of African scientists will be enhanced through training and the better research facilities that will be acquired. Research collaborations between Africa and the West will grow and all stakeholders, including the funding partners, African scientists, scientists across the globe, physicians and patients will be the eventual winners.
Computational and Evolutionary Biology/Bioinformatics, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK ; Microbiology Unit, Department of Biological Sciences, Nasarawa State University, Keffi, Nigeria.
Moses P
MP
Adoga
Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Cambridge, UK ; International Health Research Group, Department of Public Health & Primary Care, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK ; H3ABioNet Node, National Biotechnology Development Agency, NABDA/FMST, Abuja, Nigeria.
Segun A
SA
Fatumo
Innovative Biotech USA Inc., Havre de Grace Corporate Center, Lab 1, 224 North Washington Street, Havre de Grace, MD 21078, USA ; Innovative Biotech, Keffi/Abuja, Nigeria.
Simon M
SM
Agwale
Africa; Bioinformatics; Genetics; Genomics; H3Africa; Health; Heredity; NIH; Wellcome Trust