This study was carried out to determine the human host preference and presence of Plasmodium parasite in field collected Anopheles mosquitoes among four villages around a military cantonment located in malaria endemic Sonitpur district of Assam, India. Encountered malaria vector mosquitoes were identified and tested for host preference and Plasmodium presence using PCR method. Human host preference was detected using simple PCR, whereas vectorial status for Plasmodium parasite was confirmed using first round PCR with genus specific primers and thereafter nested PCR with three Plasmodium species specific primers. Out of 1874 blood fed vector mosquitoes collected, 187 (10%) were processed for PCR, which revealed that 40.6% had fed on human blood; 9.2% of human blood fed mosquito were harbouring Plasmodium parasites, 71.4% of which were confirmed to Plasmodium falciparum. In addition to An. minimus, An. annularis and An. culicifacies were also found positive for malaria parasites. The present study exhibits the human feeding tendency of Anopheles vectors highlighting their malaria parasite transmission potential. The present study may serve as a model for understanding the human host preference of malaria vectors and detection of malaria parasite inside the anopheline vector mosquitoes in order to update their vectorial status for estimating the possible role of these mosquitoes in malaria transmission. The study has used PCR method and suggests that PCR-based method should be used in this entire malarious region to correctly report the vectorial position of different malaria vectors.

Use of repellents seems to be most reliable method of personal protection against annoyance and infections associated with haematophagous insects. We have investigated the biting activity of Simulium and tested the repellency of five essential oils extracted from Homalomena aromatica Schott (Alismatales: Araceae), Pogostemon heyneanus Bentham (Lamiales: Lamiaceae), Citrus aurantifolia Swingle (Sapindales: Rutaceae), Vitex negundo L. (Lamiales: Lamiaceae), and Ageratum conzoides L. (Asterales: Asteraceae) on the human volunteers against Simulium (blackflies) in three locations of Arunachal Pradesh, India. Blackflies preferred biting legs (> 79%) as compared to hand and face with profound biting activity during 1000–1100 h (> 23%) and 1500 – 1600 h (> 28%). The essential oil extracted from Homalomena aromatica, Vitex negundo and Ageratum conizoides provided > 2 h protection at 5% concentration and > 5 h protection at 10% concentration in all the three testing locations. The repellency of Homalomena aromatica, Vitex negundo and Ageratum conizoides essential oils after 6 h application was > 50% at 5% concentration and > 90% at 10% concentration. The study provides evidence for the potential of these essential oils in developing new repellents against blackflies.

In the present investigation, the epidemiology of malaria among seven tea estates of Nagaon and Udalguri districts of Assam, India has been described. A cross-sectional open study was carried out to understand the malaria epidemiology and associated risk factors among the tea tribes during March to September 2009. Out of 1,182 peripheral blood smears examined, 506 found positive for malaria (slide positivity rate, SPR = 42.8) with Plasmodium falciparum as predominant species. Dimakuchi tea estate was having highest SPR (P = 0.0275) and contributed more number of P. falciparum cases (P \ 0.00001). Tea estates studied in both Udalguri and Nagaon districts were equally affected and the SPR recorded were 41.75 and 43.32% respectively. 154 malaria cases detected were having 'O' blood group but each blood group was found to have similar susceptibility of acquiring malaria infection (v 2 = 3.603; P = 0.3076) and P. falciparum infection (v 2 = 1.818; P = 0.6110). The SPR was highest among children more than 2 years of age group and variation in SPR among the age groups was statistically significant (v 2 = 17.186; P = 0.0018). No gender biasing was observed in malaria distribution. Anemia was found associated with the infection among both the sexes. The findings suggest that tea estates are endemic for stable malaria transmission primarily due to P. falciparum and the prevalence rate decline with age, suggesting the development of protective immunity. Promising intervention measures could be able to reduce the malaria prevalence effectively in the study areas.

Malaria is a complex and evolved infectious human disease that is endemic in north-eastern states of india, where malaria control relies on early active and passive case detection and prompt treatment through malaria camps and village level health workers (Dhiman et al. 2011). since malaria associated with fever and other symptoms is the most common diagnosis in rural settings, the incorrect diagnosis may have severe public health implications (Anash et al. 2010). A considerable proportion of patients treated for malaria actually do not have malaria (Prasad 2009). Furthermore, missed out true malaria cases may act as epicentres for disease transmission at a local level. resistance to anti-malarials, decay in health infrastructure, population movement and socio-political unrest are contributing factors to the spread of malaria (gardner et al. 2002). Accurate diagnosis of malaria cases could be useful in lowering such conjectures and ultimately reducing malaria burden in endemic settings.Until recently, microscopic examination of blood smears has been a standard method for malaria diagnosis by convenience (Anash et al. 2010). Microscopy, however, requires well trained technical staff and it is also rather labour intensive and time consuming (Maltha et al. 2010). Hand-held non-microscopic immunochromatographic rapid diagnostic tests (rDt's) are simple, sensitive and specific, and good results have been achieved with them in various endemic regions. since their introduction during the late 1990's, rDt's have undergone many changes and currently three-band rDt's for detecting both Plasmodium falciparum Welch, 1897 specific antigen and Plasmodium-specific antigen (PAN-specific) have been developed (Moody 2002). the performance of the rDt's in the diagnosis of malaria has been validated throughout the malaria endemic regions (Moody 2002, Anash et al. 2010, however, the rDt's were unable to identify mixed infections, owing to the common PAN-specific antibody capture band, when compared to the polymerase chain reaction (Pcr) assay. in addition, the rDt's have not been found suitable to diagnose malaria where parasite counts were as low as < 50 parasite/µl (iqbal et al. 1999).the plDH based optiMAl-it ® has some limitations, but as on today, it has been proved to be one of the best rDt available for on spot detection of malaria parasite Nested PCR detection of Plasmodium malariae from microscopy confirmed P. falciparum samples in endemic area of NE India Abstract: the present study evaluates the performance of optiMAl-it ® test and nested Pcr assay in detection of malaria parasites. A total of 76 randomly selected blood samples collected from two malaria endemic areas were tested for malaria parasites using microscopy and optiMAl-it ® test in the field. Pcr assays were performed in the laboratory using DNA extracted from blood spots of the same samples collected on the FtA ™ classic cards. of the total of 61 field confirmed malaria positive samples, only 58 (95%) were detected positive using microscopy in the laboratory....

Present studies indicate that a-tocopherol enhances the efficacy of cisplatin as demonstrated by inoculation of Daltons lymphoma cells incubated with either cisplatin (5 or 10 µg/ml) alone or cisplatin + atocopherol (25 or 50 µg/ml) into C3H/He mice. Tumour cells (3 x 10 6 cells/mouse) incubated with cisplatin grow slowly in syngeneic mice as indicated by the late appearance of tumour. However, mice failed to develop tumour when inoculated with tumour cells incubated with cisplatin + a-tocopherol. When the animals were challenged with tumour cells (3 x 10 6 cells/mouse) on the 15th day after the initial inoculation, 30-50% survived more than 60 days, with 10% tumourfree survivors being observed in some groups. Antitumour activity was higher in mice receiving lymphoma cells (3 x 10 6 cells/mouse) preincubated with cisplatin + a-tocopherol compared to cisplatin alone. Tumour-bearing mice receiving cisplatin in combination with different concentrations of a-tocopherol exhibited significantly higher (P<0.001) intratumour platinum content (123-306%) but without any change in the kidney platinum content as compared to those receiving cisplatin (5 or 10 µg/ml) alone. Enhancement of cisplatin-induced tumour growth inhibition is probably due to the modulation of tumour cell membrane permeability by a-tocopherol. a-Tocopherol might increase the influx of cisplatin into tumour cells, causing the DNA repair machinery to be less efficient due to increased efficiency of adduct formation in the DNA molecule. This effect of a-tocopherol can render cisplatin more effective as an antitumour agent. Correspondence