The initiative will harness AI to better understand malaria drug resistance.
Kampala, Uganda, 27th January, 2026 – Today, the Infectious Diseases Institute at Makerere University, has received $2 million as part of Google.org’s $20 million AI for Science Fund to support organizations focused on cutting-edge AI for science research. The funding has been awarded to twelve academic and nonprofit organizations around the world that are using AI to address increasingly complex problems at the intersections of various disciplines of science. Google.org is excited to support the Infectious Diseases Institute at Makerere University as they leverage AI towards achieving scientific breakthroughs, and plans to continue funding meaningful initiatives that exemplify AI’s ability to enable science at digital speed.
“This project presents a significant opportunity to apply artificial intelligence to stay ahead of malaria, a disease which affects millions of people in Africa, especially children and pregnant women. This project will strengthen our capacity for monitoring and early detection of malaria drug resistance, hence contributing directly to sustaining treatment effectiveness and accelerating progress toward malaria
elimination,” said Dr. Daudi Jjingo.
“We’re giving researchers the resources to fast-track AI breakthroughs, achieving in years what once took decades.” said Leslie Yeh, Google.org’s Director of Scientific Progress. “The AI for Science fund is supporting twelve organizations who are using AI to tackle some of the world’s most complex scientific challenges like disease prevention, protecting our food systems and mapping the natural world.”
With this funding, the Infectious Diseases Institute at Makerere University aims to implement an AI-driven project to accelerate the identification and prioritization of parasite mutations that drive malaria drug resistance. This will involve the integration of malaria genomics, variant effect modeling, AlphaFold’s near-experimental accuracy in protein structure prediction and laboratory validation. For more information about this work, visit https://ace.ac.ug/aimar.
About The Infectious Diseases Institute at Makerere University
The Infectious Diseases Institute (IDI) at Makerere University is an organization whose mission is to strengthen health systems in Africa, with strong emphasis on infectious diseases, through research and capacity development. Established as a research center of excellence within IDI, the African Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics and Data-Intensive Sciences (ACE) leverages AI, bioinformatics and high-performance computing to address critical health challenges by conducting impactful research in antimicrobial resistance, human genomics, cancer and malaria, while building sustainable scientific capacity through advanced research training.