Genome-wide association studies to map genetic variation underlying mosquito susceptibility to human malaria

仅在2009年，疟疾就导致近80万人死亡，其中大部分是非洲的儿童。事实证明，以传播这种疾病的蚊子为目标是减少疟疾病例数量的最有效战略。由于蚊子倾向于在夜间和室内叮咬，近年来蚊帐的使用增加导致疟疾病例减少。然而，一些蚊子显示出在白天和户外蚊子叮咬增加的证据，那里的蚊帐没有保护作用，因此必须开发新的控制方法。基于一些蚊子比其他蚊子更好地传播疟疾这一事实，该项目旨在利用一种密切检查蚊子基因组的技术来调查这些蚊子基因构成的差异。这种比较和后续测试将确定与蚊子携带最致命的人类疟疾能力相关的基因。发现对疟疾传播有重大影响的蚊子基因，是迈向有希望的战略的关键一步，即开发针对寄生虫的药物和疫苗，而这些药物和疫苗可以针对蚊子体内的寄生虫。

Malaria killed nearly 800,000 people in 2009 alone, mostly children in Africa. Targeting the mosquitoes that transmit the disease has proven to be the most effective strategy towards reducing the number of malaria cases. As mosquitoes tend to bite at night and indoors, the increased use of bednets in recent years has contributed to the decrease of malaria cases. However, some mosquitoes are showing evidence of increased biting in the daytime and outdoors where bednets offer no protection, so new methods of control must be developed. Based on the fact that some mosquitoes are better malaria transmitters than others, this project aims to investigate the differences in the genetic make-up of these mosquitoes using a technology that intimately examines the mosquito genome. This comparison and follow-up tests will identify genes that are associated with mosquito capacity to carry the most deadly of the human malarias. Discovering the mosquito genes that have a big impact on malaria transmission is an essential step towards the promising strategy of developing drugs and vaccines that target the parasite while it is in the mosquito.