The progress resulting from genomic research is significant. It has already advanced our knowledge of infectious diseases. The complete genomic sequences of many pathogens responsible for morbidity and mortality in the developing world are now established. The new tools in comparative genomics, computational biology, and informatics have already yielded promising results in studying invertebrate parasites that cause tropical diseases. When combined with the sequence of the human genome, and the sequence of some of the vectors of disease, like the Anopheles mosquitoes that transmit malaria parasites, they offer remarkable opportunities for reducing the negative impact of these diseases.
However, the authors point out that the applications of this research might only benefit patients in the First World, since there has been little or no commercial interest in developing treatments against the tropical diseases that occur among the world's poorest people. The authors illustrate this with several diseases such as malaria, hookworm and AIDS. "To achieve greater impact for the developing countries it will be necessary to combine the efforts made by some not-for-profit organisations and private funds to support research for the developing world and to link genomic research with vaccine research and other technologies
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Contact: Ellen Peerenboom
peerenbo@embl-heidelberg.de
49-6221-8891-108
European Molecular Biology Laboratory
10-Sep-2002