Many human made malaria vaccines and combative agents are becoming less and less powerful as malaria becomes more immune to their powers over time. However, it has been reported that practically natural ways to combat the infectious disease have been developed. Say hello to genetically engineered fungus carrying genes for a human anti-malarial antibody and a scorpion anti-malarial toxin.
Raymond St. Leger, a professor of entomology at the University of Maryland states:
“Though applied here to combat malaria, our transgenic fungal approach is a very flexible one that allows design and delivery of gene products targeted to almost any disease-carrying arthropod. In this current study we show that spraying malaria-transmitting mosquitoes with a fungus genetically altered to produce molecules that target malaria-causing sporozoites could reduce disease transmission to humans by at least five-fold compared to using an un-engineered fungus.”
Both the fungal antibody and the scorpion toxin specifically target the malaria-causing parasite P. falciparum. Plasmodium falciparum is a protozoan parasite, one of the species of Plasmodium that cause malaria in humans. It is transmitted by the female Anopheles mosquito. P. falciparum is the most dangerous of these infections as P. falciparum (or malignant) malaria has the highest rates of complications and mortality. As of 2006 it accounted for 91% of all 247 million human malarial infections (98% in Africa) and 90% of the deaths. It is more prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa than in other regions of the world; in most African countries, more than 75% of cases were due to P.falciparum, whereas in most other countries with malaria transmission, other Plasmodial species predominate.
The research team found that spraying mosquitoes with the transgenic fungus significantly reduced parasite development. The malaria-causing parasite P. falciparum was found in the salivary glands of just 25% of the mosquitoes sprayed with the transgenic fungi, compared to 87% of those sprayed with the wild-type strain of the fungus and to 94% of those that were not sprayed. Even in the 25% of mosquitoes that still had parasites after being sprayed with the transgenic fungi, parasite numbers were reduced by over 95% compared to the mosquitoes sprayed with the wild-type fungus.
Leger continues:
“Now that we’ve demonstrated the effectiveness of this approach and cleared several U.S. regulatory hurdles for transgenic Metarhizium products, our principal aim is to get this technology into field-testing in Africa as soon as possible.”
Infection by malaria-causing parasites results in approximately 240 million cases around the globe annually, and causes more than 850,000 deaths each year, mostly children, according to the World Health Organization. Most of these cases occur in sub-Saharan Africa, but the disease is present in 108 countries in regions around the world. Treating bed nets and indoor walls with insecticides is the main prevention strategy in developing countries, but mosquitoes are slowly becoming resistant to these insecticides, rendering them ineffective.
Leger finalizes:
“Insects are a critical part of the natural diversity and the health of our environment, but our interactions with them aren’t always to our benefit. Mosquitoes have an incredible ability to evolve and adapt so there may be no permanent fix. However, our current transgenic combination could translate into additional decades of effective use of fungi as an anti-malarial biopesticide. Our engineered strains slow speed of kill enabled mosquitoes to achieve part of their reproductive output, and so reduces selection pressure for resistance to the biopesticide.”
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Written by Sy Kraft, B.A.