A toolbox to study liver stage malaria

Abstract

The first obligatory phase of mammalian infection by Plasmodium parasites, the causative agents of malaria, occurs in the liver of the host. This stage of Plasmodium infection bears enormous potential for anti-malarial intervention. Recent technological progress has strongly contributed to overcoming some of the long-standing difficulties in experimentally assessing hepatic infection by Plasmodium. Here, we review appropriate infection models and infection assessment tools, and provide a comprehensive description of recent advances in experimental strategies to investigate the liver stage of malaria. These issues are discussed in the context of current challenges in the field to provide researchers with the technical tools that enable effective experimental approaches to study liver stage malaria.