Prof Julie Makani is Associate Professor in the Department of Haematology and Blood Transfusion at Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS) http://www.muhas.ac.tz, which is the main clinical http://www.mnh.or.tz/, academic and research centre in Tanzania. Tanzania has recognised sickle cell disease (SCD), as a major public health problem and it has been included as a priority condition in the national strategy for Non-Communicable Diseases in the Ministry of Health. With global partnerships, Muhimbili has developed a systematic framework for comprehensive research that is integrated into healthcare, advocacy and education. With prospective surveillance (2004 - 2016) of over 5,000 SCD patients; this is one of the largest single-center, SCD research programs in the world. Scientific themes include clinical and biomedical research (including genomics) and public health [including ethics, social/ behavioral science, population health and health policy]. The aim is to use SCD as a model to establish scientific and healthcare solutions in Africa that are locally relevant and globally significant. Julie trained in Medicine (Tanzania) and Internal Medicine (UK), and completed her PhD in Clinical Epidemiology of SCD. She is a Consultant Physician at the MUHAS University Hospital, MAMC.
Julie have been involved in establishing networks at different levels: institutional, national, regional, Africa and Global to address the burden of SCD in SSA. Julie serves as Principal Investigator (PI) on the Sickle Pan-African Research Consortium (SPARCO 2015-2021) in Tanzania, Ghana and Nigeria which together with the Sickle Africa Data Coordinating Center (SADaCC) forms SickleInAfrica http://www.sickleinafrica.org/. She also serves as Co-PI on SickleGenAfrica, investigating the genetic basis of disease progression http://sicklegenafrica.com/ and she serves as Site PI for MUHAS for H3ABioNet https://www.h3abionet.org/. With partnerships, she has established networks at institutional, national, regional (REDAC), African (Sickle Pan-African Network - 17 countries), and global level (http://www.globalsicklecelldisease.org). For advocacy/ awareness, she set up the Sickle Cell Foundation of Tanzania (2010-2016) and a member of the Tanzania Sickle Cell Disease Alliance (2016).
Julie was a Wellcome Trust Research Fellow [Training (2003 - 2009) and Intermediate (2012 - 2017)] and Tutu Leadership Fellow (2009). She received the 2011 Royal Society Pfizer Award for her work in using anaemia in SCD as a model of translating genetic research into health benefit. She is a Fellow of Royal College of Physicians of the United Kingdom and Tanzania Academy of Sciences.
In SickleInAfrica, Julie serves as Lead PI for Sickle Pan-African Research Consortium (SPARCO) Clinical Coordinating Center - SPARCO Center.
Dr. Sangeda is a lecturer and Head of the Department of Pharmaceutical Microbiology at the MUHAS node. Raphael graduated with a B. Pharm from Dr MGR Medical University, Chennai, India in 1998. In 2005, he obtained his MSc in Medical Microbiology at Jomo Kenyata University of Agriculture and Technology. In 2005 he joined Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, now KU Leuven, in Belgium where he graduated in M. Pharm (2006), MSc. Bioinformatics (2008) and PhD (2013) on the use of Bioinformatics approaches to predict HIV drug resistance.
Having started my career in biomedical research (developmental molecular genetics) I now support researchers to undertake research and translate research outputs into real world impacts. Support includes grant funding, communication, partnerships with industry, technology transfer, career development, grant management and capacity building.
Ms. Manongi holds a Bachelor of International Relations (BIR) from the University of Dodoma, Tanzania. She also possesses a Master’s degree in Public Administration from Mzumbe University, Tanzania. She has over four years of experience in Human Resources and administrative activities. She has worked with Dar es Salaam Water and Sewerage Authority (DAWASA), Ando Roofing products, CRDB Bank Tanzania currently working with the Sickle Cell Programme as Head of Project Administration and Finance. She provides administrative support to the Sickle Cell Programme in several areas such as administrative support during grant applications, organizing research meetings/symposia, health care meetings/events and other programme administrative activities. She also has skills in performance management organization recruitment staff welfare issues and other office human resources and administration functions. She possesses strong communication skills, conflict resolution skills and negotiation skills.
Mr Hokororo is an Accountant dealing with Financial Management and Grant Management. He has 23 years experience in a position directly dealing with recording and monitoring of transactions, and reporting financial performance of international NGO’s. His work always involved liaising with financial and banking institutions in ensuring efficient management of liquid resources. Prior to practicing accountancy he worked as an auditor for 7 years in an international audit firm, the then Coopers Lybrand.
Ms. Nkanyemka holds Master’s Degree in Women’s Law (MWL) from Southern and Eastern Regional Centre for Womens’ Law of University of Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe. In 2004, she obtained her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Public Administration specialized in International Relations. She is a Programme Management Specialist with over 14 years’ experience on Projects and Programmes Management with Government and International Non-Governmental Organisations (INGOs). 
Dr. Irene Kida Minja is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Restorative Dentistry at the Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences. Her academic responsibilities include training of both undergraduate and postgraduate students. She is also a member of the Curriculum Committee, as well as Chair of the Research and Publication Committee of the School of Dentistry. At University level, She is a coordinator of the Health Profession Educators Group (HPEGs) and member of the Senate Research and Publication Committee (SRPC), as well as the Senate Continuing Education and Professional Development (DCEPD) - MUHAS.
Nesia is the Country Director at CBM International - Tanzania country office, a leading International Development Organization on Disability and Inclusion Initiatives. Nesia has over 15 years of extensive experience on international development programme with vast experience on International NGO's management and development, Disability Inclusive Development, Youth, Education, Leadership and Corporate Governance, Health, Business Strategy and Community Development as well as fostering strategic partnerships. .jpg)
Ms. Masamu is a holder of Master of Statistics from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium. She works as Statistician at Sickle Cell Program which is under the department of Hematology of Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Science (MUHAS). As a statistician she provides assistance to a number of projects such as H3ABionet which is a consortium of Pan African Bioinformatics networks for H3Africa (Human heredity and Health in Africa). As part of H3ABionet she is involved in a number of activities such as developing bioinformatics pipelines, designing standard case report forms (crf) and organizing and facilitating bioinformatics training at MUHAS node. As part of her statistical support she also provides assistance to projects such as Sickle Pan-African Research consortium (SPARCO) in areas such as statistical analysis, research design, manuscript development, Genome Wide Association Studies (GWAS) and clinical epidemiology. She is a recipient of Tanzania SPARCO Research fellow grant with the aim of supporting the upgrade of biorepository to support genomics and clinical research at the program. She has currently been appointed as data and research coordinator for the Tanzania SPARCO Clinical and Coordinating Center. She has strong skills in software such as R, Rapidminer, SAS , SPSS,REDCap and Stata.
Ms. Mgaya graduated from University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), Tanzania in Microbiology and Chemistry. She specialized in Sickle Cell Disease (SCD) with a Postgraduate Diploma in Haemoglobinopathy. She is currently pursuing the MSc by Research and Publication at Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS). She has worked with MUHAS Sickle Cell Programme as a Laboratory Scientist for over 10 years and has specialized in diagnostic services for SCD: haemoglobin electrophoresis isoelectric focusing and High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) in one of the few laboratories in the country to be able to perform all these tests. She believes the provision of efficient testing systems is key to both SCD care and research. As head of Research Laboratory she manages personnel, quality assurance activities as well as maintaining the biorepository.