Wednesday, 16 November 2011 14:25

 The following media release was issued on Monday 7th November 2011, about research that indicates a new possible route to developing a vaccine for malaria.

Julian Rayner an EVIMalaR Affiliate, Gavin Wright and their collaborators describe a unique and essential protein–protein interaction between P. falciparum and red blood cells (Rh5 and Basigin) and suggest that blocking this might be a means to develop new treatments.

Please see the press release below.

Media Briefing: identification of crucial interaction between Plasmodium falciparum and red blood cells – paper in Nature

Outline

Monday 7 November 2011, 10.30-11.30

Wellcome Trust, 215 Euston Road, London NW1 2BE

10.30  Introduction:

• Jonathan Webb, Press Officer, Science Media Centre

10.35  Presentations:

• Dr Julian Rayner, Malaria Programme, Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton, Cambridge
• Dr Gavin Wright, Cell Signalling Laboratory, Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton, Cambridge

11.30  End, opportunity for one-to-one

Resources

Press Release from Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute

Paper in prepublication form from Nature

Video available by ftp from press.office@sanger.ac.uk

• B-roll and interview clips with the five main authors
• Animation of malaria entry into red blood cell

Still photography (see Sample Images at end) available from press.office@sanger.ac.uk

• Portraits of the five main authors
• Images of the labs
• Images of the Plasmodium parasite, mosquitoes and life cycle

Author websites

• Wright lab: http://www.sanger.ac.uk/research/projects/cellsurfacesignalling/
• Rayner lab: http://www.sanger.ac.uk/research/projects/malariaprogramme-rayner/

Malaria websites

• Malaria Challenge multimedia resource: http://www.yourgenome.org/malariachallenge/
• WHO sections: http://www.who.int/topics/malaria/en/ and http://www.who.int/malaria/en/
• Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/topics/Pages/malaria.aspx
• Path: Malaria Vaccine Initiative: http://www.malariavaccine.org/
• Medicines for Malaria Venture: http://www.mmv.org/
• Wellcome Trust malaria section: http://malaria.wellcome.ac.uk/

Publication details

Basigin is a receptor essential for erythrocyte invasion by Plasmodium falciparum.

Cécile Crosnier*, Leyla Y Bustamante*, S Josefin Bartholdson*, Amy K Bei, Michel Theron, Makoto Uchikawa, Souleymane Mboup, Omar Ndir, Dominic P Kwiatkowski, Manoj T Duraisingh, Julian C Rayner, Gavin J Wright

*These authors contributed equally to this work

Nature, published online on Wednesday 8 November 2011

doi: 10.1038/nature10606

Participating Centres

• Cell Surface Signalling Laboratory and Malaria Programme, Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton, Cambridge UK
• Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA USA
• Tokyo Red Cross Blood Center, Tokyo, Japan
• Laboratory of Bacteriology and Virology, Le Dantec Hospital and Laboratory of Parasitology, Cheikh Anta Diop University, Dakar, Senegal
• Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, Oxford UK