The immunobiology of myiasis infections--whatever happened to vaccination?

Metazoan Parasite Vaccines: Present Status and Future Prospects

Eukaryotic parasites and pathogens continue to cause some of the most detrimental and difficult to treat diseases (or disease states) in both humans and animals, while also continuously expanding into non-endemic countries. Combined with the ever growing number of reports on drug-resistance and the lack of effective treatment programs for many metazoan diseases, the impact that these organisms will have on quality of life remain a global challenge. Vaccination as an effective prophylactic treatment has been demonstrated for well over 200 years for bacterial and viral diseases. From the earliest variolation procedures to the cutting edge technologies employed today, many protective preparations have been successfully developed for use in both medical and veterinary applications. In spite of the successes of these applications in the discovery of subunit vaccines against prokaryotic pathogens, not many targets have been successfully developed into vaccines directed against metazoan parasites. With the current increase in -omics technologies and metadata for eukaryotic parasites, target discovery for vaccine development can be expedited. However, a good understanding of the host/vector/pathogen interface is needed to understand the underlying biological, biochemical and immunological components that will confer a protective response in the host animal. Therefore, systems biology is rapidly coming of age in the pursuit of effective parasite vaccines. Despite the difficulties, a number of approaches have been developed and applied to parasitic helminths and arthropods. This review will focus on key aspects of vaccine development that require attention in the battle against these metazoan parasites, as well as successes in the field of vaccine development for helminthiases and ectoparasites. Lastly, we propose future direction of applying successes in pursuit of next generation vaccines.

The Battle Against Flystrike - Past Research and New Prospects Through Genomics

Flystrike, or cutaneous myiasis, is caused by blow fly larvae of the genus Lucilia. This disease is a major problem in countries with large sheep populations. In Australia, Lucilia cuprina (Wiedemann, 1830) is the principal fly involved in flystrike. While much research has been conducted on L. cuprina, including physical, chemical, immunological, genetic and biological investigations, the molecular biology of this fly is still poorly understood. The recent sequencing, assembly and annotation of the draft genome and analyses of selected transcriptomes of L. cuprina have given a first global glimpse of its molecular biology and insights into host-fly interactions, insecticide resistance genes and intervention targets. The present article introduces L. cuprina, flystrike and associated issues, details past control efforts and research foci, reviews salient aspects of the L. cuprina genome project and discusses how the new genomic and transcriptomic resources for this fly might accelerate fundamental molecular research of L. cuprina towards developing new methods for the treatment and control of flystrike.

An overview on different aspects of hypodermosis: Current status and future prospects

Livestock plays a vital role in economic development of a nation and is being used in agriculture for draft power, production of farmyard manure as well as milk and meat production. Bovine hypodermosis is the top culprit among all parasitic infections across the world. Hypodermosis is an endemic disease in the mountainous areas/plain areas and is regularly observed in the northern hemisphere of the globe affecting cattle, deer, yaks and buffaloes. There is a wide variation in geographical distribution of Hypoderma spp. during the years 1945-2015. The manuscript includes a geospatial study that tries to maps the global distribution of hypodermosis in different areas of the world in order to detect hotspots or endemic areas that may be a potential source for disease spread. This information's are very useful to predict the potential high risk areas that are prone to disease outbreak. The present review aims to evaluate the global distribution, molecular discrimination, diagnostics and vaccination of hypodermosis, focusing on its current status and future perspectives towards the management of the disease and its control strategies.