Sequence of Plasmodium falciparum chromosomes 2, 10, 11 and 14

Abstract

The mosquito-borne malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum kills an estimated 0.7–2.7 million people every year, primarily children in sub-Saharan Africa. Without effective interventions, a variety of factors—including the spread of parasites resistant to antimalarial drugs and the increasing insecticide resistance of mosquitoes—may cause the number of malaria cases to double over the next two decades¹. To stimulate basic research and facilitate the development of new drugs and vaccines, the genome of Plasmodium falciparum clone 3D7 has been sequenced using a chromosome-by-chromosome shotgun strategy^2,3,4. We report here the nucleotide sequences of chromosomes 10, 11 and 14, and a re-analysis of the chromosome 2 sequence⁵. These chromosomes represent about 35% of the 23-megabase P. falciparum genome.