red blood cells

Flowcytometry was used to study expression of CR1, CD55 and CD59 in 50 Pf cases and 30 normal healthy volunteers.

We designed a micro-bead device mimicking the geometry of the human narrow and short inter-endothelial slits. Upon filtration through a mixture of 5-25 μm diameter micro-beads, Plasmodium falciparum-hosting RBC (Pf-RBC) were retained in a parasite developmental stage-dependent way, the retention rates of a subset of ring-RBC being similar in micro-beads and in isolated-perfused human spleens.

In this study, the sequence of RAP-3 was finely mapped using synthetic peptides in order to identify which are the specific binding regions involved in RAP3–RBC interactions.

Receptor–ligand assays carried out in this study found that peptides 36,051 (101DKKFSESLKAHMDHLKILNN120Y), 36,053 (141KKYIIKEIQNNKYLNKEKKS160), 36,055 (181WLESVNNIEEKSNILKNIKS200Y) and 36,056 (201QLLNNIASLNHTLSEEIKNI220Y), located in the central portion of Pf34, were found to establish protease-sensitive interactions of high affinity and specificity with receptors on the surface of red blood cell (RBCs).

Importantly, these results also demonstrated that the experimental cerebral malaria model shares many features with human pathology and might be a relevant model to study its pathogenesis.

In this article, we review a wide range of optical techniques for quantitative measurements of critical homeostatic parameters in malaria-infected red blood cells.