This quarter’s malaria expert is Dr. Fiona Angrisano – Fiona focuses on anti-malarial transmission blocking vaccines and is currently a Senior Research Officer with the Burnet Institute in Melbourne.
Fiona completed her PhD at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, with Professor Jake Baum in 2015. Her research focused on investigating the way in which Plasmodium parasites move, both into the red blood cell during the process of invasion, and through the mosquito midgut during the process of malaria transmission.
After her PhD, Fiona moved to Imperial College London and Cambridge University with Dr. Andrew Blagborough as a Research Associate. During this time, her research focus shifted to incorporate a more translational emphasis, with the overall aim of identifying and developing anti-malarial transmission blocking vaccines.
Fiona’s key interests involve the discovery of multiple new anti-malarial vaccine antigen candidates, the establishment of new delivery systems, and the design of multiple pre-clinical and clinical studies to assess vaccine effectiveness.
Q&A:
1) What first drew you to focus your research on malaria?
I have always found host/pathogen interactions fascinating. The ability of a parasite to manipulate the host in order for its’ own survival has always intrigued me. This curiosity led me to begin working on Plasmodium (the parasite that causes the disease, malaria) during my honors year at university. The complexity and unique idiosyncrasies of Plasmodium biology has sustained my interest for the last 14 years. It is also easy to stay motivated and focused when working on understanding and preventing a disease that affects the most vulnerable individuals in malaria endemic countries.
2) What are the biggest challenges – both in terms of scientific discovery and practical application at the community level – of developing and deploying a vaccine for malaria?
There are many obstacles frustrating malaria vaccine development. From a scientific discovery point of view, Plasmodium parasites are genetically complex, with a complicated lifecycle that takes place in both humans and mosquitoes. This makes developing a vaccine against the parasite technically complex. The development of immunity to malaria from exposure to Plasmodium parasites does not confer lifelong protection; unlike diseases we currently have effective vaccines against. Any acquired immunity only partially protects an individual against future disease. This means we cannot approach a malaria vaccine with the same strategy we do for other diseases.
Traditionally, malaria is a disease of the low- and middle-income countries and this in turn means there is a lack of a traditional investor market funded vaccine development, due to a perception of lower commercial return on investment.
Current vaccines available against malaria require huge logistically complex pipelines in order to reach remote settings of endemic countries to administer the vaccine. An example of which is the requirement for cold chain logistics to keep temperatures from varying too much so as to not reduce the potency of the vaccine.
3) What are you working on now?
My current research expands on my parasitology and vaccinology background to incorporate sero-surveillance assays of not only malaria, but other mosquito borne diseases, vaccine preventable diseases and neglected tropical diseases in Papua New Guinea. I am developing assays to monitor the spread of multiple pathogens allowing rapid identification of outbreaks, resurgent and resistant pathogens. The data arising from these assays will contribute towards decision making and policy options for key health systems within PNG.