Generation of knockout/knockdown of aspartate aminotransferase and malate quinone oxidoreductase in plasmodium

Abstract

Plasmodium, a protozoan parasite is the causative agent of malaria. In 1880, Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, a French army surgeon was the first to observe Plasmodium parasites in the blood of patients who suffered from malaria. In 1897, a British officer in India, Ronald Ross, found that parasites were transferred to Culicine mosquitoes from birds infected with Plasmodium relictum. Giovanni Battista Grassi, Angello Celli, Ettore Marchiafava, Camillo Golgi and Raimondo Filetti, in 1898, first introduced the names Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium malariae for two of the malaria parasites that affect humans. They also found that human malarial parasite was transmitted by Anopheles mosquito. Henry Shortt and Cyril Garnham, in 1948 discovered that Plasmodium develops in liver before entering the bloodstream. In 1982, Wojciech Krotoski discovered the presence of dormant parasites in liver cells (Cox, 2010). Plasmodium causes malaria in most vertebrates namely, reptiles birds and mammals (Hayakawa et al., 2008). Each Plasmodium species restricts infection to a particular host. Studies have revealed parasite-host co-evolution with diversification of malarial parasites coinciding with radiation of mammalian genera (Sherman, 1979). Malaria in humans, is caused by four different species of Plasmodium: Plasmodium falciparum, Plasmodium malariae, Plasmodium ovalae, Plasmodium vivax. A recent report also indicates that the primate malarial parasite Plasmodium knowlesi is the fifth human malarial parasite (White, 2008). The symptoms of malarial infection include, fever, chill, severe anemia and metabolic acidosis.