(Press-News.org) Researchers have identified a new means to eradicate malaria infections by rapidly killing the blood-borne Plasmodium parasites that cause the disease.
Malaria causes up to 3 million deaths each year, predominantly afflicting vulnerable people such as children under five and pregnant women, in tropical regions of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Treatments are available for this disease, but the Plasmodium parasite is fast becoming resistant to the most common drugs, and health authorities say they desperately need new strategies to tackle the disease.
This new potential treatment uses molecules that interfere with an important stage of the parasite's growth cycle and harnesses this effect to kill them. The impact is so acute it kills ninety per cent of the parasites in just three hours and all those tested in laboratory samples of infected human blood cells, within twelve hours.
The research was carried out by chemists at Imperial College London and biological scientists from the research institutions Institut Pasteur and CNRS in France. Their work is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Lead researcher Dr Matthew Fuchter, from Imperial College London, said: "Plasmodium falciparum causes 90 per cent of malaria deaths, and its ability to resist current therapies is spreading dramatically. Whilst many new drugs are in development, a significant proportion are minor alterations, working in the same way as current ones and therefore may only be effective in the short term. We believe we may have identified the parasite's 'Achilles' Heel', using a molecule that disrupts many vital processes for its survival and development."
The research has identified two chemical compounds that affect Plasmodium falciparum's ability to carry out transcription, the key process that translates genetic code into proteins. These compounds are able to kill the parasite during the long period of its complex life cycle while it inhabits the blood-stream. This is in contrast to the majority of antimalarial drugs, whose action is limited to shorter stages of Plasmodium's life cycle.
"One particularly exciting aspect of this discovery is this new molecule's ability to rapidly kill off all traces of the parasite, acting at least as fast as the best currently available antimalarial drug," said Dr Fuchter.
Initial tests also showed the molecules were able to kill strains of Plasmodium that have developed a resistance to current treatments, although the scientists say more experiments are needed to confirm these results.
The scientists hope to refine these molecules, improving their effectiveness and proving this to be a viable strategy for treating malaria in humans. They hope it will lead to the development of an effective malaria cure within the next ten years.
### This research was supported by the New York Pasteur Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and received funding from the European Research Council (ERC).
"Small-molecule histone methyltransferase inhibitors display rapid antimalarial activity against all blood stage forms in Plasmodium falciparum" is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) by Nicholas A. Malmquist, Thomas A. Moss, Salah Mecheri, Artur Scherf, Matthew J. Fuchter. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1205414109 http://www.pnas.org/content/109/41/16708.abstract
New opportunity for rapid treatment of malaria
2012-10-25
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Did the changing climate shrink Europe's ancient hippos?
2012-10-25
Giant German hippopotamuses wallowing on the banks of the Elbe are not a common sight. Yet 1.8 million years ago hippos were a prominent part of European wildlife, when mega-fauna such as woolly mammoths and giant cave bears bestrode the continent. Now palaeontologists writing in Boreas, believe that the changing climate during the Pleistocene Era may have forced Europe's hippos to shrink to pygmy sizes before driving them to warmer climes.
"Species of hippo ranged across pre-historic Europe, including the giant Hippopotamus antiquus a huge animal which often weighed ...
DNA's double stranded stretch
2012-10-25
Theoretical physicists like to play with very unconventional toys. Manoel Manghi from Toulouse University in France and his colleagues have adopted a seemingly playful approach to examining what happens to a double stranded molecule of DNA when it is stretched to the breaking point, in a study about to be published in EPJ E. Instead of using optical tweezers to stretch DNA as previously done in experimental settings, the authors focused on using a theoretical model to account for the structural deformations of DNA and determine how its mechanical characteristics could explain ...
Peer review option proposed for biodiversity data
2012-10-25
Copenhagen, Denmark – Data publishers should have the option of submitting their biodiversity datasets for peer review, according to a discussion paper commissioned by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF).
The proposal is among a set of recommendations made by Mark Costello and co-authors in the paper Quality assurance and Intellectual Property Rights in advancing biodiversity data publication, freely available for download through the GBIF Online Resource Centre.
The paper argues that concerns over data quality impede the use of large biodiversity databases ...
Lonely older adults face more health risks
2012-10-25
Montreal, October 25, 2012 – Always look on the bright side of life. Thanks to a new study from Concordia University, this catchy refrain offers a prescription for staying healthy during one's golden years.
Research has shown that lonely older adults are at greater risk of developing health problems but a new study by Carsten Wrosch, a professor in Concordia's Department of Psychology and member of the Centre for Research in Human Development, offers hope. In a forthcoming article in Psychosomatic Medicine, Wrosch proves that older adults who approach life with a positive ...
After-effects of Saturn's super storm shine on
2012-10-25
VIDEO:
This animation shows the evolution of Saturn's 'Great Springtime Storm' in the planet's stratosphere. It is based on observations performed at mid-infrared wavelengths.
As clouds broke out in Saturn's stormy troposphere,...
Click here for more information.
The heat-seeking capabilities of the international Cassini spacecraft and two ground-based telescopes have provided the first look at the aftermath of Saturn's 'Great Springtime Storm'. Concealed from the naked ...
Gene that's usually bad news loses its punch if you live to your 90s, Mayo study finds
2012-10-25
ROCHESTER, Minn. -- A gene linked to the risk of developing Alzheimer's, heart disease and diabetes becomes less important to quality of life once people hit their 90s, a Mayo Clinic study shows. At that point, good friends and a positive attitude have a bigger impact, the researchers say. The findings are published this month in the Journal of American Medical Directors Association.
Researchers used the National Institutes of Health-supported Rochester Epidemiology Project, a database of patient records in Olmsted County, Minn., to find people ages 90 to 99 living on ...
Highlights of the 25th Congress of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology 2012
2012-10-25
In the course of the 25th ECNP Congress leading experts and five and a half thousand psychiatrists, neurologists, neuroscience researchers and public health professionals from over 90 different countries met from 13 to 17 October 2012 in Vienna, Austria, to celebrate ECNP´s 25-year anniversary and engage in groundbreaking debate.
Against the background of the increasing burden of disorders of the brain and restrained drug development in this area, the ECNP Congress once again highlighted the key importance of neuroscience for better treatment and prevention. "Crucially, ...
US NAS and Royal Society Issue Statement on Earthquake Case in Italy
2012-10-25
The case of six Italian scientists sentenced to be jailed for failing to warn of the L'Aquila earthquake in Italy in 2009 highlights the difficult task facing scientists in dealing with risk communication and uncertainty.
We deal with risks and uncertainty all the time in our daily lives. Weather forecasts do not come with guarantees and despite the death tolls on our roads we continue to use bikes, cars, and buses. We have also long built our homes and workplaces in areas known to have a history of earthquakes, floods, or volcanic activity.
Much as society and governments ...
New bio-adhesive polymer demonstrated in JoVE
2012-10-25
A new video-article in JoVE, Journal of Visualized Experiments, details the use of a new laser-activated bio-adhesive polymer. The chitosan-based polymer, SurgiLux, was developed by scientists at the University of New South Wales. Chitosan is a polymer derived from chitin, which is found in fungal cell walls or in exoskeletons of crustaceans and insects.This molecular component allows SurgiLux to form low energy bonds between the polymer and the desired tissue when it absorbs light. The technology may soon replace traditional sutures in the clinic.
For thousands of years, ...
Omega-3 intake heightens working memory in healthy young adults
2012-10-25
PITTSBURGH—While Omega-3 essential fatty acids—found in foods like wild fish and grass-fed livestock—are necessary for human body functioning, their effects on the working memory of healthy young adults have not been studied until now.
In the first study of its kind, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have determined that healthy young adults ages 18-25 can improve their working memory even further by increasing their Omega-3 fatty acid intake. Their findings have been published online in PLOS One.
"Before seeing this data, I would have said it was impossible ...