Immunology

Sleeping sickness by stealth

(Medical Xpress)—Stealth is a well-known concept in military tactics. Almost since the invention of radar, the hunt began for counter-technologies to hide aircraft and missiles from detection – most successfully by modifying ...

Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes

New insights into the world of trypanosomes

Single specimens of the vermicular pathogens causing sleeping sickness swim inside the gut of the tsetse fly between blood cells which the fly has ingested from an infected mammal. This is where they start their week-long ...

Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes

News from the pathogen that causes sleeping sickness

The life-threatening African trypanosomiasis, also called sleeping sickness, is caused by protozoa of the species Trypanosoma brucei. A team at the Biocentre of the Julius-Maximilians-Universität (JMU) Würzburg in Bavaria, ...

Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes

How some trypanosomes cause sleeping sickness while others don't

Trypanosome parasites transmitted by tsetse flies cause devastating diseases in humans and livestock. Different subspecies infect different hosts: Trypanosoma brucei brucei infects cattle but is non-infectious to humans, ...