BiotechMashup

Researchers have synthesized the entire protein that is responsible for life-threatening malaria in pregnant women and their unborn children. The protein known as VAR2CSA enables malaria parasites to accumulate in the placenta and can therefore potentially be used as the main component in a vaccine to trigger antibodies that protect pregnant women against malaria. The research team is now planning to test the efficacy of the protein-based vaccine on humans.

(University of Copenhagen) Researchers at the University of Copenhagen have become the first in the world to synthesize the entire protein that is responsible for life-threatening malaria in pregnant women and their unborn children. The protein known as VAR2CSA enables malaria parasites to accumulate in the placenta and can therefore potentially be used as the main component in a vaccine to trigger antibodies that protect pregnant women against malaria. The research team is now planning to test the efficacy of the protein-based vaccine on humans.

(Burness Communications) The US-based PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, the United States Agency for International Development Malaria Vaccine Development Program, and Dutch biopharmaceutical company Crucell N.V. today announced a collaboration to accelerate development of a promising type of malaria vaccine. Through funding from the USAID MVDP, the partners will conduct studies to determine the effectiveness of Crucell's novel prime-boost vaccine approach against the malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum.

Every year, 10,000 pregnant women and up to 200,000 newborn babies are killed by the malaria parasite. Doctors all around the globe have for years been looking in vain for a medical protection, and now researchers in Denmark have found the biochemically weakness of the lethal malaria parasite, and will now start developing a vaccine to combat pregnancy related malaria.

Researchers have uncovered a group of proteins that could form the basis of an effective vaccine against malaria. These new findings support the development of a vaccine against the blood-stage of malaria.

Development of an effective vaccine for malaria is a step closer following identification of a key pathway used by the malaria parasite to infect human cells. The discovery provides a new vaccine target through which infection with the deadly disease could be prevented.

New research synthesizes information from many different studies that attempt to link specific antibody responses to Plasmodium falciparum with protection from clinical malaria and comes to important conclusions about which antigens might be worth advancing as vaccine candidates.

(Burness Communications) Development of a vaccine to prevent the malaria parasite from entering the human liver is the goal of a new collaboration announced today by global leaders in malaria research and vaccine development. The PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, Merck and NYU Langone Medical Center are working together to evaluate an approach targeting a novel part of a major surface protein on the malaria parasite.

(Burness Communications) The PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative today announced a new collaboration to initiate development toward a vaccine that may eventually help eliminate and eradicate malaria. This collaboration with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the Sabin Vaccine Institute marks MVI's first investment in transmission-blocking vaccines. This vaccine approach aims to stop the malaria parasite from developing in the mosquito, effectively blocking transmission of malaria from mosquitoes to humans.