• Submitted by: Juana
• Health and Medicine
• 07 / 16 / 2015

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An international team of scientists has identified a new compound to treat malaria and is the first that disables a protein that the parasite needs to survive in the different phases of its "complicated life cycle," according to the journal Science Translational Medicine.
If human trials are successful, the compound, called DSM265, may be a new tool "to prevent and treat infection" with microscopic parasites that cause malaria, a disease transmitted by the bite of a mosquito and kills more than half a million people per year.
The new compound developed by a group of 20 institutions from three continents, focuses on cellular protein produced by the malaria parasite, called DHODH.
The new compound requires less frequent dosing and thus blocks the parasite at the stage of infection of the blood and liver.
Researchers are now testing the safety and efficacy of the new compound against plasmodium, including multidrug resistant strains in multiple models of both human cells and in mice, dogs and monkeys.

source: www.cibercuba.com