Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) School of Public Health www.jhsph.edu received $525,000 in grant funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation www.gatesfoundation.org to evaluate a promising technology to detect malaria parasites in saliva before individuals get sick and become carriers of the parasite.
The team part of the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute http://malaria.jhsph.edu will work with the biotech firm Ceres Nanosciences www.ceresnano.com to assess a sampling platform developed by Ceres.
Despite progress to eliminate the mosquito-borne illness, malaria still sickens an estimate 200 million people a year and kills about 600,000 people, mostly children under the age of five. Non-invasive tests to provide a rapid diagnosis is critical in reducing first time malaria cases and can possibly block transmission by people that have recovered but yet still carry the parasite.
What is needed is an inexpensive rapid diagnostic test that could be used to assess children and adults in large scale screenings in settings such as schools and community centers. Those who test positive would receive antimalarials, which could greatly reduce an infection source.
Preliminary research suggests there is a new set of malaria biomarkers present in saliva, which could identify a larger population of malaria carriers than previously estimated. The Ceres test uses their Nanotrap® particle technology to sample and enrich saliva to identify the presence of the malaria biomarker.
The Nanotrap technology was invented at George Mason University www.gmu.edu with funding from NIH www.nih.gov for biomarker discovery applications and currently is being developed into commercial products by Ceres with continuing support from NIH, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency www.darpa.mil, Department of Homeland Security www.dhs.gov, and the Commonwealth of Virginia www.virginia.gov.
During a six month evaluation, the Hopkins team will work with Ceres to evaluate whether the biomarker can increase the percentage of asymptomatic carriers of malaria that can be correctly diagnosed.
In another project, Ceres Nanosciences received $430,000 in funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a test for Ebola using their Nanotrap® particle technology to develop a new method for detecting the Ebola virus in saliva.
During the four month research period, Ceres will work in close collaboration with George Mason University and the Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) www.usamriid.army.mil to assess whether the Nanotrap technology can be used to develop a more sensitive and safe Ebola virus detection method which uses saliva instead of blood