ovale

Hypnozoites are dormant forms in the life cycles of certain parasitic protozoa that belong to the Phylum Apicomplexa (Sporozoa) and are best known for their probable association with latency and relapse in human malarial infections caused by Plasmodium ovale and P. vivax. 

The qPCR assay developed proved optimal for detection of all four Plasmodium species.

Human malaria is caused by four human-host restricted or adapted species of the genus Plasmodium, listed here in their order of risk for causing severe disease Plasmodium falciparum, Plasmodium vivax, Plasmodium ovale and Plasmodium malariae – or so we thought.

We used a genus- and species-specific nested polymerase chain reaction, targeting highly conserved regions of the small subunit ribosomal RNA (SSU rRNA) gene, to investigate the presence of malaria parasites in a total number of 379 patient samples in a survey of patients with febrile illnesses in the Chittagong Hill Tracts in Southeastern Bangladesh.

Malaria has had a greater impact on world history than any other infectious disease. More than 300 to 500 million individuals worldwide are infected with Plasmodium spp, and 1.5 to 2.7 million people a year, most of whom are children, die from the infection.