{"id":101924,"date":"2020-02-05T12:45:56","date_gmt":"2020-02-05T20:45:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2020\/02\/development-of-transgenic-fungi-that-kill-human-malaria-parasites-in-mosquitoes"},"modified":"2020-02-05T12:45:56","modified_gmt":"2020-02-05T20:45:56","slug":"development-of-transgenic-fungi-that-kill-human-malaria-parasites-in-mosquitoes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2020\/02\/development-of-transgenic-fungi-that-kill-human-malaria-parasites-in-mosquitoes","title":{"rendered":"Development of Transgenic Fungi That Kill Human Malaria Parasites in Mosquitoes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/development-of-transgenic-fungi-that-kill-human-malaria-parasites-in-mosquitoes.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em><i><i>Metarhizium<\/i> anisopliae<\/i><\/em> infects mosquitoes through the cuticle and proliferates in the hemolymph. To allow <em><i>M. anisopliae<\/i><\/em> to combat malaria in mosquitoes with advanced malaria infections, we produced recombinant strains expressing molecules that target sporozoites as they travel through the hemolymph to the salivary glands. Eleven days after a <em><i>Plasmodium<\/i><\/em>-infected blood meal, mosquitoes were treated with <em><i>M. anisopliae<\/i><\/em> expressing salivary gland and midgut peptide 1 (SM1), which blocks attachment of sporozoites to salivary glands; a single-chain antibody that agglutinates sporozoites; or scorpine, which is an antimicrobial toxin. These reduced sporozoite counts by 71%, 85%, and 90%, respectively. <em><i>M. anisopliae<\/i><\/em> expressing scorpine and an [SM1]<sub>8<\/sub>:scorpine fusion protein reduced sporozoite counts by 98%, suggesting that <em><i>Metarhizium<\/i><\/em>-mediated inhibition of <em><i>Plasmodium<\/i><\/em> development could be a powerful weapon for combating malaria.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Metarhizium anisopliae infects mosquitoes through the cuticle and proliferates in the hemolymph. To allow M. anisopliae to combat malaria in mosquitoes with advanced malaria infections, we produced recombinant strains expressing molecules that target sporozoites as they travel through the hemolymph to the salivary glands. Eleven days after a Plasmodium-infected blood meal, mosquitoes were treated with [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":542,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-101924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/542"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101924"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101924\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}