Research Project: A lipidomics approach to identify biomarkers and nutritional interventions to improve birth outcomes in HIV-positive pregnancy. 

Year(s): 2017-2019

Dr. Kayode Balogun is a postdoctorate fellow at the Toronto General Research Institute. His research interests concern maternal and infant health in the face of infection, and he is interested in understanding how an adverse in utero environment caused by HIV contributes to adverse birth outcomes and fetal developmental programming, with a goal of identifying biomarkers and interventions to improve birth outcomes in high risk pregnancy.

Dr. Balogun’s current research investigates the impact of in utero exposure to hIV antiretrovirals on fetal development and neurocognitive performance. During his time as a postdoctorate fellow, he aims to understand the mechanisms involved in the adverse outcomes associated with the use of HIV antiretrovirals during pregnancy using clinical samples collected from HIV-positive and HIV-negative pregnant women and validated using in vitro animal models.

Dr. Balogun completed his bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from Lagos State University, Nigeria. He then went on to obtain his MSc from in biomedical science from the University of East London, and completed his PhD in biochemistry from Memorial University in 2015. His supervisors for this fellowship will be Drs. Lena Serghides and Sharon Walmsley.