疟原虫配子体检测方法研究进展与应用

Progress and application of Plasmodium gametocyte detection method

疟原虫是引起疟疾的病原体,其生活史复杂,配子体是传播阶段。评估流行区无症状人群的配子体流行度,选择合理的用药方案清除配子体,对疟疾消除具有重要意义。然而,传统镜检方法检测配子体敏感性不高,且无性期原虫与配子体基因组一致,因此基因组检测方法也不适合检测配子体。缺乏敏感性高、高通量的配子体检测方法给疟疾消除策略的制定和筛选配子体药物带来了困难。随着技术的不断发展,人们开发出了检测疟原虫配子体的新方法,包括检测配子体期特异表达m RNA的分子检测方法、磁分选和转基因疟原虫方法。这些方法被应用于配子体的流行病学调查、生物学研究和药物筛选等方面,不仅使人们对配子体流行度有了全新认识,对其形成机制有了更深入的理解,也筛选出了一批杀配子体药物。其中NASBA方法具有敏感性高、快速和高通量的优点,在现场应用方面显示出优势,但还存在试剂昂贵、需要特殊仪器等不足。配子体检测方法的不断进步将对消除疟疾起到重要的推动作用。

Plasmodium is the pathogen of malaria, which life cycle is complex. The gametocyte stage is responsible forthe spread of illness. It’s important to investigate the prevalence of asymptomatic gametocyte in endemic areas and choose areasonable regimen to clear gametocyte in peripheral blood for malaria elimination. However, the sensitivity of microscopic fordetecting gametocyte is not high, and because of the same genome of the gametocyte and asexual stage parasite genome, the ge-nomic detection method to not suitable for detect gametocyte. Lacking of high sensitivity and high-throughput detection methodfor gametocyte hampered malaria elimination strategy developing and drug screening. With the development of technology, peo-ple developed some new method for detecting Plasmodium gametocytes, including methods based on amplify the gametocytestage-specific m RNA, magnetic fractionation and transgenic Plasmodium. These methods have been applied to the gametocyteepidemiological investigation, biological research and drug screening, which promoting a deeper understanding about gameto-cyte epidemiology, gametogenesis and gametocyte killing drugs. In these methods, NASBA has advantages of high sensitivity,fast and high-throughput, which had been applied in the field study, but the expensive reagents and special equipment limitedthe application of NASBA. Progress in gametophyte detection methods will plays an important role in eliminating the human ma-laria.