Federal Project Grant Award Summary

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) awarded The Pennsylvania State University a Project Grant totaling $842,720 on April 2, 2026, under the Allergy and Infectious Diseases Research program (CFDA 93.855). The five-year project, concluding March 31, 2031, will develop statistical models and methodologies to address critical information gaps in the global HIV response. The deliverables include longitudinal and spatial estimates of key populations in Sub-Saharan Africa countries with generalized HIV epidemics; HIV incidence inference for sub-national areas and populations at high risk; and open-source software implementing the proposed statistical methods to support evidence-based HIV policy and program design.

The project will produce freely available research tools and collaborate with global and local organizations to disseminate findings and methodologies. By leveraging newly available HIV-related data and state-of-the-art analytical approaches, the research aims to identify geographic regions and populations where the HIV response is underperforming, thereby enabling more effective and efficient public health interventions aligned with global targets for reducing new infections.