Research Papers/Topics in Laboratory Technology

Serum Cytokine Profiles as Biomarker in Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberclosis

ABSTRACT Background: Tuberculosis (TB) remains a major threat to public health despite several efforts to curb the disease. Contributions made by TB control programs have been tremendous; however, the emergence of multi-drug resistant (MDR) tuberculosis is a big threat to the control efforts and calls for innovative measures to mitigate the effect. New TB control programs with a comprehensive approach to dealing with MDR-TB is needed globally. In particular, new nonsputum based diagnostic to...

PREVALENCE OF PFHRP2 AND/OR PFHRP3 GENE DELETIONS IN PLASMODIUM FALCIPARUM ISOLATES AND THE PERFORMANCE OF HRP2 BASED MALARIA RAPID DIAGNOSTIC TESTS

ABSTRACT BACKGROUND: Malaria rapid diagnostic tests (MRDTs) are important for malaria disease management. However, performance of the RDTs is affected when the targeted antigens in the parasite have a variation or are altogether absent. The most common parasite target antigen in RDTs, Plasmodium falciparum histidine-rich protein 2 (HRP2), has been reported to be absent in some P. falciparum parasites. Loss of the pfhrp2 in P. falciparum parasites affects the accuracy of PfHRP2 based RDT kits ...