Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn and Child Health
Harnessing bacterial genomics to understand how antimicrobial-resistant bacteria evolve and spread among pregnant women, mothers, newborns and children, and to prevent the infections they cause.
Why it matters
Our goal
Sustainably reduce maternal and neonatal mortality and the burden of resistant bacterial infections in pregnant women, mothers and newborns, through an approach combining microbiological surveillance, microbiome analysis, bacterial genomics and targeted infection prevention and control.
Specific objectives
What the programme sets out to achieve.
Characterise the bacteria behind maternal and neonatal infections, their resistance profiles and genomic determinants.
Identify the biological, environmental and organisational factors linked to infection risk around birth.
Develop and validate risk stratification and diagnostic tools suited to resource-limited care settings.
Strengthen infection prevention and control (IPC) practices in maternity and neonatal units.
Main activities
- Longitudinal mother–child cohorts in hospital and community settings
- Microbiological, microbiome and genomic analyses of clinically relevant isolates
- Identification and validation of biomarkers predicting maternal and neonatal infection
- Predictive tools and clinical decision support
- Assessment and follow-up of hygiene and IPC practices in maternity and neonatal units
Funded projects
Competitive grants carried by this programme. Click a project to open its page.
Milestones ahead
Deliverables planned under the institute’s strategic plan.
- Multi-site longitudinal mother–child cohorts
- Predictive tools for perinatal infection risk
- A validated diagnostic prototype or clinical decision support tool
- Clinical and biological data integrated in a secure, operational data centre