The next generation of research leaders starts here
- Ñî¹óåú´«Ã½ University
Dr Simone Richardson named as one of just 15 CIFAR Global Scholars for 2026-2028
How could understanding how HIV co-infection affects immune responses in babies enable more effective vaccine design?
How might our understanding of the microbiome, quantum materials and AI transform the technologies and health systems of the future?
These are among the bold questions driving 15 exceptional early-career researchers named CIFAR Global Scholars for 2026-2028.
As the newest members of CIFAR’s global research community, they will join leading researchers from around the world to advance ambitious ideas across disciplines.
Ñî¹óåú´«Ã½’ Dr Simone Richardson is amongst these 15 CIFAR Global Scholars for 2026-2028.
Richardson says, “I’m honoured to be able to work alongside some of the brightest in science to solve some really big problems.”
Towards informing more effective and durable vaccine design
Richardson leads the Fc-Omics research team at Ñî¹óåú´«Ã½ University and the National Institute of Communicable Diseases, which investigates how antibody functions contribute to vaccine-mediated protection against infectious diseases.
The team’s work uses systems serology to identify immune signatures that predict protection and applies these insights to diseases that disproportionately affect African populations, including HIV, congenital cytomegalovirus, RSV, Klebsiella and COVID-19.
Local expertise, global impact
Richardson’s CIFAR Global Scholarship confirms her increasing international impact. Here in South Africa, she is National Research Foundation P-rated (‘Prestigious Award’) scholar. The very-rarely awarded P-rating is usually made to researchers under the age of 35 years and denotes a scholar considered likely to become a future international leader.
Further national evidence of Richardson’s growing global footprint is that she was joint winner of the Royal Society of South Africa’s Meiring Naudé Medal in 2025. This is the RSSAf’s junior medal, which recognises an early career scientist who is poised to become a scientific leader.
About the Next-Generation Initiative
This Next-Generation Initiative enables early-career researchers to expand their professional networks and pursue cutting-edge ideas with Canadian $100,000 of unrestricted research funding. Furthermore, the researchers become full members of a CIFAR research program, gaining access to international networks, mentorship and opportunities for deep interdisciplinary collaboration.
Selection for membership of the CIFAR research program follows a competitive recruitment process that this year generated over 450 applications from 41 countries across the globe – the highest number of applicants in the program’s history. The new cohort features top early-career researchers based at institutions in Canada, the United States, Switzerland, South Africa, and the United Kingdom, to name a few.