Integrating data from multiple African countries to identify and validate novel insecticide resistance candidates in the malaria vector An. gambiae sl

病媒控制战略是消灭疟疾工作的关键；自2000年以来预防的6.63亿疟疾病例中，估计有80%是由于使用了经杀虫剂处理的蚊帐（ITNs和室内残留喷洒）。由于病媒控制的这种扩大，对公共卫生杀虫剂的抗药性现在广泛传播。所有itn都用拟除虫菊酯治疗，但80%的非洲国家报告对这类药物产生耐药性。这种耐药性对ITNs保护功效的确切影响仍在辩论中，但人们一致认为，迫切需要制定知情的实地战略，以防止这些关键干预措施失败，因此；与疟疾有关的发病率和死亡率在世界最贫穷地区重新抬头。对病媒控制失败的潜在影响的关注刺激了撒哈拉以南非洲疟疾病媒的各种实地数据的产生，包括广泛的种群遗传资源和全大陆的基因表达数据。这些数据代表了一组令人难以置信的多样化和丰富的信息，这些信息以前是单独研究的。以客观的方式整合这些多物种、多国家的数据集，预计将确定以前未被识别的与杀虫剂抗性相关的基因和途径。在开发诊断方法之前，这些计算机结果将在实验室环境中进行验证，然后在现场环境中进行评估。有了一套全面的抗药基因，还可以更详细地研究抗药对蚊子适应性的影响及其传播疟疾寄生虫的能力。所产生的数据将有助于控制规划，以帮助减轻耐药性的影响，并有助于工业伙伴开发新的杀虫剂和病媒控制工具。

Vector control strategies are key to malaria eradication efforts; an estimated 80 % of the 663 million malaria cases prevented since the year 2000 were due to insecticide treated nets (ITNs and indoor residual spraying). As a result of this scale up in vector control, resistance to public health insecticides is now wide spread. All ITNs are treated with pyrethroids and yet 80% of African countries reporting resistance to this class. The precise impact of this resistance on the protective efficacy of ITNs is still being debated but there is consensus that there is an urgent need for informed field strategies to prevent failure of these crucial interventions and hence; the resurgence of malaria associated morbidity and mortality in the world's poorest regions.Concerns over the potential impact of vector control failure have stimulated the generation of a wide variety of field data available on malaria vectors in sub-Saharan Africa, including extensive population genetics resources and continent-wide gene expression data. These data represent an incredibly diverse and rich set of information that have previously been examined in isolation. Integrating these multi-species, multi-country datasets in an objective way, is expected to identify previously unrecognised genes and pathways associated with insecticide resistance. These in silico results will be validated in a laboratory setting prior to the development of diagnostics which will be evaluated under field settings. The availability of a comprehensive set of resistance makers will also enable more detailed studies of the impact of resistance on the fitness of the mosquito and its ability to transmit the malaria parasite. The data generated will be of value to control programmes to help mitigate the impact of resistance, and industry partners, developing new insecticides and vector control tools.