The Eck Institute for Global Health is an administrative structure at the University of Notre Dame that brings together a diverse group of faculty, staff, and students from several different Colleges and Departments in the University whose research and teaching is focused on human pathogens and their invertebrate and vertebrate vectors, the diseases caused by these organisms, and the impact of these diseases on human society. Members of the Institute are concerned, in particular, with the impact of infectious diseases in less developed parts of the world, and research interests of Institute members range from biomedical science to issues of human rights. Institute members also work on new and emerging infectious diseases of importance in the United States, especially those like West Nile encephalitis and Lyme disease whose public health impact is significantly influenced by human impacts on the environment. Among the diseases studied at the Institute are malaria, toxoplasmosis, tuberculosis, lymphatic filariasis, leishmaniasis, dengue, and West Nile encephalitis. Many faculty work specifically on arthropod vectors, particularly mosquito vectors of arboviruses, filarial worms, and malaria parasites, tick vectors of the Lyme disease spirochete, and sand fly vectors of Leishmania parasites. Examples of some of the areas of research interest among Institute faculty include:

Biology of Intracellular Pathogens:
Bacterial and protozoan pathogens that invade and replicate in host cells for their survival and replication are the cause of numerous human diseases, including tuberculosis, malaria, leishmaniasis, and others. Institute scientists are interested in the molecular mechanisms whereby these intracellular pathogens bind to and invade their host cells as well as in how the host immune system responds to pathogens that 'hide' within host cells. Answers to questions like these are necessary to validate drug targets and vaccine candidates against diseases caused by these pathogens. A variety of techniques and approaches are used by the various laboratories investigating these pathogens, including classical cellular and molecular techniques, proteomics and bioinformatics, immunological tools, and even whole animal studies.

Genomics and Integrative Research:
Technological advances in high-throughput sequencing, functional genomics, and computational procedures have changed the pace of biological discovery and promise to revolutionize our understanding of how genes and genomes of hosts and pathogens interact to generate critical disease phenotypes. The genomes of many of the pathogens and their arthropod vectors investigated by Institute faculty have now been fully sequenced. These 'blueprints' provide a unifying framework for understanding the complex interplay of genes controlling such traits as vector competence, pathogen virulence, and drug/pesticide resistance. Computational biology has become an important research tool in many Institute laboratories, where approaches range from computational analyses of large genome data sets to molecular modeling of the structures of important biomolecules and how small molecules antagonists or inhibitors might interact with them. Work by many Institute faculty involves interdisciplinary research approaches that combine biology with mathematics, chemistry, physics and computational sciences.

Tools for Genetic Engineering of Vectors and Pathogens:
Many of the biomedical faculty in the Institute employ research techniques that involve the genetic engineering of vectors or pathogens. The uses of such tools by Institute laboratories vary from genetic transformation of pathogens and vectors for the analysis of gene structure and function to the genetic transformation of arthropod vectors in order to develop strains that are refractory to pathogen transmission. Development of improved genetic engineering tools for vectors has been a major focus in several Institute laboratories for many years. One of the most widely used tools for the genetic transformation of arthropod vectors (as well as many economically important insects) was discovered by an Institute scientist, and the Institute continues to be an international leader in this exciting new research arena.

Population and Evolutionary Genetics:
A number of members of the Institute are also active participants in the Population and Evolutionary Genetics Group. 'PEG' is an interdisciplinary working group within the Department of Biological Sciences whose common research interests center on understanding the many ways that organisms, including vectors and pathogens, evolve at the molecular level. Research categories include Statistical Genetics and Genomics, Population Genetics, Speciation, Ecological Genetics and Population Biology, and Evolutionary Biology and Systematics.

Rational Drug Design:
Several laboratories in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry are involved in collaborative and individual projects directed at the design and discovery of new therapeutic small molecules for the treatment of infectious diseases, vector-borne diseases, cancer, and rare (orphan) diseases. This work is being pursued by a large and extremely productive group of biochemists and organic chemists and their co-workers. Treatments for malaria and tuberculosis are among the many maladies being investigated. Two strategies are being pursued - both a more traditional natural products-based approach, and a rigorous, computationally based de novo molecular design strategy. Much of this research overlaps with the work of the Walther Cancer Research Center and the Keck Transgene Center, two other Notre Dame Centers with a focus on public health.

Interdisciplinary Approaches to Global Health:
Infectious Diseases have causes and effects that are both biological and social; they account not only for untold suffering, but also contribute to slow economic growth and fragile political stability. Good health is among the most basic of human rights, and Institute faculty are aware of the fundamental role that social, ethical, and historical forces play in the origin and impact of global health problems. The Institute provides the venue for cooperation among faculty from a broad variety of departments, institutes, and centers within the university who work to understand and ameliorate the effects of infectious diseases, especially in places where the university has research and teaching strengths in the developing world. Global health is clearly not simply a biomedical problem, when nearly half of all deaths in sub-Saharan Africa are caused by pathogens for which effective treatments are widely available in the more affluent countries of the world. The University of Notre Dame embraces the concept that health is a basic human right, and as a community we recognize our unique obligation in this area. The Institute offers a forum for interdisciplinary global health research that can also help overcome obstacles to state-building, prosperity, and peace in Africa and elsewhere. Natural partners and collaborators in this effort include faculty from a number of disciplines in the humanities and social sciences, as well as the Kellogg Institute for International Studies, the Kroc Institute for Peace Studies, the Center for Social Concerns, and other organizations in the Institute for Church Life.

Faculty in the Institute receive support from major federal funding agencies such as the NIH, NSF, DOD, and USDA, from private foundations like John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Ellison Medical Foundation, Burroughs Wellcome Fund, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, from international funding bodies like the World Health Organization, from pharmaceutical industries, from the State of Indiana, from the University of Notre Dame, and from private benefactors. The Institute has sponsored a number of program grants, including the a Gates Foundation lymphatic filariasis elimination program in Haiti, a NIAID Tropical Disease Research Unit grant, and an NIH Training Grant in Experimental Parasitology and Vector Biology that has trained graduate students and postdoctoral fellows for more than three decades.