Genomics and Its Impact on Parasitology and the Potential for Development of New Parasite Control Methods

Abstract

Parasitic organisms remain the scourge of the developed and underdeveloped worlds. Malaria, schistosomiasis, leishmaniasis, and trypanosomiasis, for example, still result in a large number of human deaths each year worldwide, while drug resistance among nematodes still poses a major problem to the livestock industries. Genome projects involving parasitic organisms are now abundant, and technologies for the investigations of the parasite transcriptome and proteome are well established. There is no doubt the era of the "omics" is with parasitology, and current trends in the discipline are addressing fundamental biological questions that can make best use of the new technologies, as well as the vast amount of new data being generated. Will this become the "golden age of molecular parasitology," leading to the control of parasitic diseases that have plagued mankind for hundreds of years? The primary aim of this paper is to review advances in the general area of parasite genomics, and to outline where the application of "omics" technologies can and have impacted on the development of new control methods for parasitic organisms.

Current status and future prospects for a vaccine against schistosomiasis

“…A significant development that may well alter our understanding of schistosome biology and approaches to vaccine development is the advance of proteomics and genomics [80]. The advance of a schistosome genome project and the isolation of expressed sequence tags (ESTs) for an increasing number of …”

Prevalence of theileriosis and babesiosis in cattle in Sirajganj district of Bangladesh

“…Among tickborne hemoprotozoan parasites of vertebrates Theileria and Babesia are the species that have a major effect on livestock health (Mehlhorn and Schein, 1984). Babesiosis, like most haemoparasites, has generally been shown to cause destruction of red blood cells resulting in anaemia, jaundice, anorexia, weight loss and infertility (Ellis et al, 2003); and Theileria sp.is a common protozoan parasite of cattle transmitted by Hyalomma sp. ticks, responsible for tropical theileriosis, a disease which has been reported from various parts of the world (Oliveira et al, 1995;Durrani et al, 2010;Tavassoli et al, 2011).…”

Developing vaccines to control protozoan parasites in ruminants: Dead or alive?

“…Parasite antigens that may be involved in invasion and survival in the host such as those secreted from micronemes, rhopteries or dense granules or those antigens that are abundant on the surface of tachyzoites have been highlighted (Hemphill et al, 1999;Jenkins, 2001;Ellis et al, 2003;Mercier et al, 2005). Understanding critical protective immune responses may also be important in selecting relevant antigens.…”