Research - Malaria Unit

Our malaria research aims directly to improve the treatment of the disease globally. The focus of MORU is on the treatment of severe malaria, mechanisms and spread of anitmalarial drug resistance, and the pathophysiology of falciparum and vivax malaria. These are not isolated areas, i.e. studies on pathophysiology are used to formulate novel adjuvant therapies and studies on drug resistance translate into recommendations on the use of artemisinin based combination therapies.

Laboratory studies are conducted in our laboratories in Bangkok, though there is a network of collaborators (see appendix). The laboratories in Bangkok also support the clinical studies. Clinical studies on severe malaria are conducted in Rourkela, Orissa, India and Chittagong, Bangladesh. Moreover, the multicentre trials ‘SEAQUAMAT’ and 'AQUAMAT'  used sites elsewhere in the tropics. Fewer severe malaria patients are recruited nowadays in Mae Sot, on the Thai-Myanmar border, where the focus has shifted to detailed studies in uncomplicated malaria. A clinical study on vivax malaria is currently conducted in Calcutta, India.