Research Centre director among 'Top Research Scientist Malaysia Awards' recipients.

According to the academy, the scientists were selected based on their active involvement in research for the last five years with at least 10 years of cumulative contribution towards the progress of science, technology and innovation (STI) based on knowledge generation, knowledge dissemination and impact of research output.

"It was a great honour to be recognised as one of the top research scientists in the country by the Academy of Sciences Malaysia but that recognition must also go to the Unimas research team at the Malaria Research Centre, that has worked hard to translate research ideas into publications in leading international journals," he said in a statement issued by Unimas.

He was grateful for their significant contributions and also for grants from Unimas, the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation and the Welcome Trust United Kingdom that enabled research on Plasmodium Knowlesi to be undertaken.

Plasmodium Knowlesi is a monkey Malaria parasite that was thought to rarely infect humans until Prof Balbir's team reported in The Lancet in 2004 of a large number of human cases in the Kapit Division.