Malaria Vaccines: Back to the Future?

摘要

Malaria is the scourge of many developing countries, particularly those in sub-Saharan Africa, claiming several million lives each year. Researchers have struggled for decades to make a successful subunit or attenuated whole-organism vaccine but withlimited success. Factors that have hampered the development of a subunit vaccine include the complexity of the malaria life cycle, the wide variety of immune response induced by the malaria parasite, and an incomplete knowledge of protective immunity. Incontrast, attenuated whole-organism vaccines are better understood and in principle should provide full protective immunity. Encouraging news in this regard comes from Mueller et al. reporting in a recent issue of Nature (T). They show that mice immunized with genetically attenuated sporo-zoites of the rodent malaria parasite Plasmodium berghei are completely protected against challenge with wild-type sporozoites.