Genome wide analysis of placental malaria. Homo sapiens

Chronic inflammation during placental malaria (PM) caused by Plasmodium falciparum is most frequent in first-time mothers and is associated with poor maternal and fetal outcomes. In the first genome wide analysis of the local human response to sequestered malaria parasites, we identified genes associated with chronic PM, then localized the corresponding proteins and immune cell subsets in placental cryosections. Keywords: Disease state analysis Overall design: Placental samples from twenty first-time mothers were selected based on placental malaria (PM) status and RNA quality. Ten had active PM-episodes, seven of which had inflammatory cells on histology. Of the ten PM-negative women, five had histological evidence of a past PM-episode, including one with inflammatory cells.