Molecular basis of specificity of malaria parasites from the genus Laverania

Molecular basis of specificity of Laverania malaria spores 2015 Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology. Professor Youyou Tu from China, for the discovery of artemisinin in the 70s of the last century, was not only honoring her personal contribution to lowering the mortality rate of malaria patients, but also highlighting the importance of the global and still unresolved malaria problem on world. Mechanisms underlying species-specific recognition of the host by Malaria parasites of the genus Laverania that infect apes and humans are still there little known. A key step in invasion is the specific recognition of the host erythrocytes by the merozoites of the species Plasmodium. It is believed that in the course of evolution of the parasite took place change of its host as a result of the adaptation of the “gorilla” Plasmodium praefalciparum, to receptors on human erythrocytes, the result of which was the appearance of human malaria, Plasmodium falciparum. A change in specificity is suggested the binding of monkey merozoites to glycoproteins and their sugar residues which are present on human erythrocytes.

We believe that the implementation of this project will enable the detailed understanding of the specificity EBA-140 ligand of Plasmodium merozoites infecting chimpanzees and gorillas and comparison its binding specificity to the human EBA-140 ligand, giving an answer to the question of what makes P. falciparum so “human”? We hope our results will contribute to explain the molecular basis of host change in the evolution of P. falciparum, which is associated with its extreme virulence and mortality. This would be the first, data on the molecular aspects of Laverania binding with participation EBA-140 ligand and simian and human erythrocyte glycoproteins.

*The original title has been translated to English

Enabling Technologies & Assays
Genetics and Genomics

Apr 2019 — Apr 2022

$350,000

Poland