Parasites ‘Talk’ to Each Other
Melbourne scientists have made the surprise discovery that malaria parasites can “talk” to each other – a social behavior to ensure the parasite’s survival and improve its chances of being transmitted to other humans.
The finding could provide a niche for developing anti-malarial drugs and vaccines that prevent or treat the disease by cutting these communication networks.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/videos/2013/05/parasites-%E2%80%98talk%E2%80%99-each-other
Infection Renders Mosquitoes Immune to Malaria Parasites
Scientists funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, have established an inheritable bacterial infection in malaria-transmitting Anopheles mosquitoes that renders them immune to malaria parasites. Specifically, the scientists infected the mosquitoes with Wolbachia, a bacterium common among insects that previously has been shown to prevent malaria-inducing Plasmodium parasites from developing in Anopheles mosquitoes. Before now, researchers had been unable to create mosquitoes with a stable Wolbachia infection that passed consistently from mother to offspring.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news/2013/05/infection-renders-mosquitoes-immune-malaria-parasites
Parasite Treat Diseases Associated with Obesity
On the list of undesirable medical conditions, a parasitic worm infection surely ranks fairly high. Although modern pharmaceuticals have made them less of a threat in some areas, these organisms are still a major cause of disease and disability throughout much of the developing world.
But parasites are not all bad, according to new research by a team of scientists now at the Univ. of Georgia, the Harvard School of Public Health, the Université François Rabelais in Tours, France, and the Central South Univ., Changsha, Hunan, China. A study published recently in Nature Medicine demonstrates that once inside a host, many parasitic worms secrete a sugar-based anti-inflammatory molecule that might actually help treat metabolic disorders associated with obesity.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news/2013/01/parasite-treat-diseases-associated-obesity
Parasite May Cause Suicide Attempts
A parasite thought to be harmless and found in many people may actually be causing subtle changes in the brain, leading to suicide attempts. New research appearing in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry adds to the growing work linking an infection caused by the Toxoplasma gondii parasite to suicide attempts. Michigan State Univ.’s Lena Brundin was one of the lead researchers on the team.
About 10-20 percent of people in the United States have Toxoplasma gondii, or T. gondii, in their bodies, but in most it was thought to lie dormant, says Brundin, an associate professor of experimental psychiatry in MSU’s College of Human Medicine. In fact, it appears the parasite can cause inflammation over time, which produces harmful metabolites that can damage brain cells.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news/2012/08/parasite-may-cause-suicide-attempts
Overuse of Deworming Drugs Causes Resistance
A long forgotten foe is beginning to reemerge on pastures and meadows around the world, and farmers are finding that they have no way to combat it. Parasitic worms infecting cows, sheep, goats and horses are becoming resistant to the drugs used to kill them. If changes are not made in how the few remaining drugs that still work are used, there may be no way left to fight the growing threat, according to Ray Kaplan, a Univ. of Georgia professor in the department of infectious diseases.
Kaplan has studied drug-resistant parasites for years and his findings, recently published in the journal Veterinary Parasitology, warn that the continued overuse of deworming drugs has the potential to create parasites that cannot be killed.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Overuse-of-Deworming-Drugs-Causes-Resistance-072012.aspx
Parasite Blamed for Bee Disease, Decline
Researchers at the Univ. of Sheffield have discovered a parasitic mite has caused the Deformed Wing Virus to proliferate in honey bee colonies. This association is now thought to contribute to the worldwide spread and probable death of millions of honey bee colonies. The current monetary value of honey bees as commercial pollinators in the United States alone is estimated at about $15-$20 billion annually.
The research conducted in Hawaii by researchers from the Univ. of Sheffield, the Marine Biological Association, the Food and Environment Research Agency and the Univ. of Hawaii, and reported in the journal Science, showed how the Varroa mite caused Deformed Wing Virus (DWV) – a known viral pathogen – to increase its frequency among honey bee colonies from 10 percent to 100 percent.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Mite-Kills-Millions-of-Bee-Colonies-060812.aspx
Image: José Reynaldo da Fonseca, Wikimedia
Arthritis Drug Treats Deadly Parasite
Research by a collaborative group of scientists from UC San Diego School of Medicine, UC San Francisco and Wake Forest School of Medicine has led to identification of an existing drug that is effective against Entamoeba histolytica. The parasite causes amebic dysentery and liver abscesses and results in the death of more than 70,000 people worldwide each year.
Using a high-throughput screen for drugs developed by the research team, they discovered that auranofin — a drug approved by the US Food and Drug Administration 25 years ago for rheumatoid arthritis — is very effective in targeting an enzyme that protects amebae from oxygen attack (thus enhancing sensitivity of the amebae to reactive oxygen-mediated killing).
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Drug-Treats-Deadly-Parasite-052112.aspx
Bone Drug Kills Malaria in Mice
A chemically altered osteoporosis drug may be useful in fighting malaria, researchers report in a new study. Unlike similar compounds tested against many other parasitic protozoa, the drug readily crosses into the red blood cells of malaria-infected mice and kills the malaria parasite. The drug works at very low concentrations with no observed toxicity to the mouse. The study appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Bone-Drugs-Kills-Malaria-in-Mice-022812.aspx
Fruit Flies Use Alcohol as Medication
Fruit flies infected with a blood-borne parasite consume alcohol to self-medicate, a behavior that greatly increases their survival rate. “We believe our results are the first to show that alcohol consumption can have a protective effect against infectious disease, and in particular against blood-borne parasites,” says Todd Schlenke, an evolutionary geneticist at Emory Univ. who led the research.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Fruit-Flies-Use-Alcohol-as-Medication-021712.aspx
Malaria Parasite Changes Shape to Breed
New research from the Univ. of Melbourne shows how the malaria parasite (Plasmodium falciparum) changes into a banana shape before sexual reproduction, a finding that could provide targets for vaccine or drug development and may explain how the parasite evades the human immune system. The work was conducted by an Australian research team led by Matthew Dixon and PhD student Megan Dearnley from the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Bio21 Institute at the Univ. of Melbourne, and is published in the Journal of Cell Science.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Malaria-Parasite-Changes-Shape-to-Breed-021512.aspx
Fight with Parasitic Worm Heals Lungs
Intestinal worm infections may not be all bad, according to a new study by William Gause and colleagues at UMDNJ- New Jersey Medical School. The researchers have found cytokines that help oust intestinal worm infections in mice also soothe associated lung injury and inflammation. Cytokines are proteins released by cells that in turn play a role in communications among various cells in the body. The new study has been published online in advance of print in Nature Medicine.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Fight-with-Parasitic-Worm-Heals-Lungs-011612.aspx
News Update: Parasitic Fly Could Explain Bee Die-Off
Northern California scientists say they have found a possible explanation for the honey bee die-off: A parasitic fly that hijacks the bees’ bodies and causes them to abandon hives. The symptoms mirror colony collapse disorder, in which all the adult honey bees in a colony suddenly disappear. The disorder continues to decimate hives in the U.S. and overseas. The disease is of great concern, because bees pollinate about a third of the United States’ food supply. Its presence is especially alarming in California, the nation’s top producer of fruits and vegetables, where bees play an essential role in the $1 billion almond industry and other crops.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-parasitic-fly-could-explain-bee-die-off-010512.aspx
Mockingbird Benefits From Parasite Eggs
The study, by Oxford Univ. and Argentinean scientists, examined the behavior of the chalk-browed mockingbird (Mimus saturninus) which is parasitized by the shiny cowbird (Molothrus bonariensis) in Argentina. A report of the research is published in this week’s Proceedings of the Royal Society B. Shiny cowbirds regularly visit mockingbird nests and attack and puncture any eggs they find there—damaged eggs are later removed by the mockingbird host. During these visits cowbirds will often lay their own eggs in the nest for mockingbirds to hatch and bring up alongside their own chicks. Whilst mockingbirds will mob an attacking cowbird, once an alien egg has been laid in their nest they will usually accept it—even though it looks very different from their own eggs.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Mockingbird-Benefits-From-Parasite-Eggs-120911.aspx
Genomic Parasites Forever Altered Pregnancy
Genetic parasites invaded the mammalian genome more than 100 million years ago and dramatically changed the way mammals reproduce—transforming the uterus in the ancestors of humans and other mammals from the production of eggs to a nurturing home for developing young, a new Yale Univ. study has found.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Parasite-Altered-Mammalian-Pregnancy-Millions-of-Years-Ago-092611.aspx
Since the discovery of parasite eggs on mummies in the 1920s, scientists have suspected that the Nubians might have been infected by schistosomiasis. Nubia was a former African kingdom that existed from about A.D. 250 to 1400 in what is now northern Sudan.
But researchers generally assumed that the disease in Nubians had been caused by S. haematobium, a close cousin of S. mansoni that causes similar symptoms but that doesn’t require irrigation channels to thrive.
“The snail that transmits S. haematobium thrives better in water that’s moving and well oxygenated and that is not very polluted, whereas the S. mansoni snail does very well in water that’s been standing around and has more yuck in it,” said study first author Amber Campbell Hibbs, who conducted the study while at Emory.
Campbell Hibbs and colleagues examined hundreds of naturally mummified Nubian mummies.
“What happened is they were buried, and it’s so dry that you usually get mummification of the external skin, and sometimes some of the organs.”
An analysis of the mummified skin revealed traces of proteins belonging to S. mansoni—the first proof that the ancient Nubians, or any ancient civilization, were afflicted by schistosomiasis.
