Tag: Malaria

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Laser Guns to Kill Mosquitoes

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American scientists are making a ray gun to kill mosquitoes. Using technology developed under the Star Wars anti- missile programme, the zapper is  being built in Seattle where astrophysicists have created a laser that locks onto airborne insects.

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The laser — dubbed a weapon of mosquito destruction — has been designed with the help of Lowell Wood, one of the astrophysicists who worked on the original Star Wars plan to shield America from nuclear attack.

The WMD laser works by detecting the audio frequency created by the beating of mosquito wings. A computer triggers the laser beam, the mosquito’s wings are burnt off and its smoking carcass falls to the ground. The research is backed by Bill Gates, the Microsoft billionaire. It is speculated that lasers could shield villages or be fired at swarming insects from patrolling drone aircraft. “You could kill billions of mosquitoes a night,” said one expert.

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Sources: The Times Of India

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Malaria’s Sticky Secret

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A team of Australian researchers have identified a key mechanism that enables malaria-infected red blood cells to stick to the walls of blood vessels and avoid being destroyed by the body’s immune system.

The discovery highlights an important potential new target for anti-malarial drugs.

Malaria kills up to three million people every year, mostly in tropical parts of the world. The disease is spread by mosquitoes that inject victims with microscopic parasites that infect healthy red blood cells.

There are a number of different species of parasite, but the deadliest is the Plasmodium falciparum parasite.

The malaria parasite infects healthy red blood cells, where it reproduces, and producing up to thirty-two new daughter parasites. “It’s like remodelling a house so you can live in it and raise a family,” said researcher Alan Cowman from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne.

Blood cells infected by the malaria parasite lose their normal rigid shape and develop knobs on their surface, causing them to stick to blood vessel walls and stop circulating smoothly.

The parasite secretes a ‘glue’, known as PfEMP1, which travels to the surface of the infected red blood cells, leading to the formation of the knobs. The cells become sticky and adhere to the walls of the blood vessels. “This stops the cells from being cleared by the spleen, which is a protective mechanism for the parasite,” Cowman says.

“It’s absolutely essential for the parasite to survive in our bodies.”

Infected cells can also cause blood vessels to clog, a factor in some of the more serious effects of malaria such as cerebral malaria, where the disease affects the brain.

Now, the researchers, led by Cowman, have identified eight new proteins that transport the P falciparum parasite’s ‘glue’ to the surface of the infected red blood cells. They have shown that removing just one of these proteins prevents the infected red blood cells from sticking to the walls of the blood vessels.

“It really is a big step in understanding the parasite itself,” Cowman says. “In the long term it points toward concentrating on some of these proteins so that they don’t work any more, so the parasite would be cleared much more efficiently.”

It is also possible that researchers could use their new understanding to develop weakened forms of the parasite to use in a vaccine against the disease, he says.

Sources: The Times Of India

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Sea Cucumber ‘New Malaria Weapon’

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Sea cucumbers could provide a potential new weapon to block transmission of the malaria parasite, a study suggests.

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…Sea cucumbers live on the ocean floor

The slug-like creature produces a protein, lectin, which impairs development of the parasites.

An international team genetically engineered mosquitoes – which carry the malaria parasite – to produce the same protein in their gut when feeding.

The PLoS Pathogens study found the protein disrupted development of the parasites inside the insects’ stomach.

Malaria causes severe illness in 500 million people worldwide each year, and kills more than one million.

It is estimated that 40% of the world’s population are at risk of the disease.

To stimulate the mosquitoes to produce lectin, the researchers fused part of the gene from the sea cucumber which produces the protein with a gene from the insect.

The results showed that the technique was effective against several of the parasites which cause malaria.

Lectin is poisonous to the parasites when they are still in an early stage of development called an ookinete.

Usually, the ookinetes migrate through the mosquito’s stomach wall, and produce thousands of daughter cells which invade the salivary glands, and infect a human when the mosquito takes a blood meal.

But when exposed to lectin the ookinetes are killed before they can start their deadly journey.

Work left

Researcher Professor Bob Sinden, from Imperial College London, said: “These results are very promising and show that genetically engineering mosquitoes in this way has a clear impact on the parasites’ ability to multiply inside the mosquito host.”

However, he said much more work still had to be done before the technique could be used to curb the spread of malaria.

“Although the sea cucumber protein significantly reduced the number of parasites in mosquitoes, it did not totally remove them from all insects.

“At the current stage of development, the genetically modified mosquitoes would remain dangerous to humans.

“Ultimately, one aim of our field is to find a way of genetically engineering mosquitoes so that the malaria parasite cannot develop inside them.”

Professor Sanjeev Krishna, an expert in malaria at St George’s Hospital Medical School, London, said new treatments for malaria were vital, as there was some sign that the parasites which cause the disease were developing resistance to the current artemisinin drugs.

He said: “This is a very important first step in developing a potential new way to control this infection.”

Dr Ron Behrens, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said the technique showed promise in theory – but he warned that introducing genetically modified mosquitoes could be fraught with practical difficulties.

“You would have to get the modified version to become the predominant species, and that has never been done in any setting before,” he said.

Sources :BBC NEWS ( 23rd. Dec’07)

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Floating Best Stress And Pain Buster

 A recent study has found that relaxing in large, sound and   light proof tank with salt water-floating is an effective way of easing long-term stress-related pain…....CLICK & SEE

The study was conducted at the Human Performance Laboratory at Karlstad University and was carried out in collaboration with the health authorities under the Varmland County Council.

It was authored by Sven-Ake Bood, who recently completed his doctorate in psychology, with a dissertation from Karlstad University in Sweden.

The research project took under four years for concluding and included 140 individuals, all with some form of diagnosis involving stress-related long-term pain.

The recent research also agrees with an earlier thesis that improved sleep patients feels more optimistic, and the content of the vitalizing hormone prolactin increases. Anxiety, stress, depression and perception of pain declines.

The research comprised four studies that involved the treatment of pain and stress-related disorders with the aid of a floating tank. A control group that was not treated in a floating tank experienced no improvement in their health. After a period of treatment lasting a total of seven weeks, 22 percent of the participants in the floating group were entirely free of pain, and 56 experienced a clear improvement. Nineteen percent felt no change and 3 percent felt worse. And the effect persists after the treatment is completed.

“Through relaxing in floating tanks, people with long-term fibromyalgia, for instance, or depression and anxiety felt substantially better after only twelve treatments. Relaxing in a weightless state in the silent, warm floating tank activates the body’s own system for recuperation and healing,” said Sven-Ake Bood.

“The stress hormone decreases, as does blood pressure. The findings confirm and reinforce our earlier studies on the effects of relaxing in a floating tank

“The treatment method can be used for several groups, such as people with whiplash injuries, fibromyalgia, depression, and long-term stress-related pain.

“We can also see that a combination of treatment in a floating tank and traditional therapy can be effective. We are now moving on in our research and will be monitoring blood circulation in the capillaries, the oxygen uptake of the blood, and how the body’s reflexes are affected,” he added.

The study has been published in the prestigious American publication International Journal of Stress Management .

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Blood Group For Lower Malaria Risk

 

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The most common blood type in Indians seems to provide better protection against the most deadly form of malaria. British scientists have found that people with blood group O – around 38% of the Indian population – are naturally protected from some of the most severe forms of the disease, which kills around two million people annually across the globe……....click  & see

A team from Edinburgh University, with researchers in the US, Mali and Kenya, studied African children and found that those with this blood type were two-thirds less likely to experience coma or life-threatening anaemia conditions synonymous with severe malaria.

This discovery now brings hope of developing drugs which mimic the properties of red cells. In fatal malaria, it is often found that red blood cells infected by parasites block blood vessels which supply oxygen to the brain.

The malarial parasites arm the blood cells  surface with proteins which stick to blood vessel walls. O and B are the commonest blood group among Indians. Nearly 32% of north Indians and 38% south Indians have O blood group.

“The finding that red cells present in O group blood play the major role in preventing malaria from worsening is a significant finding for India. Blood is made of antigens or proteins, some of which show protection against certain diseases. Why that occurs has not been scientifically proven yet but statistically, they have shown significant protection rates,” blood safety specialist Dr Debasish Gupta said.

Edinburgh University’s Dr Alex Rowe, whose finding was published in the journal ‘PNAS’ on Tuesday, said, “This explains why some people are less likely to suffer from life-threatening malaria than others and tells us that if we can develop a drug to reduce rosetting and mimic the effect of being blood group O, we may reduce the number of children dying from severe malaria.”

The scientists found that malaria parasites recruit healthy RBCs to stick to the parasite, encasing the infected RBC inside a so-called rosette. It makes the blockage, and the disease, worse.

However, the team’s findings suggest that group O RBCs do not easily join rosettes as the cells surface structure prevents it from sticking. The study suggests that reduced rosetting of malaria parasites is the reason why people with group O blood are less likely to suffer severe malaria.

“ABO blood group types were assessed on 567 blood samples from Malian children. We found that blood group O was present in only 21% of the severe malaria cases compared to 45% of other blood groups. Rosetting was shown to be significantly lower in parasite isolates from patients with blood group O compared to non-O blood groups,” the study said.

Source: The Times Of India

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