ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION The development of gene-based malaria vaccines represents one of three major current approaches to malaria vaccine development. The largest effort is currently on the design and development of protein/adjuvant vaccines, as illustrated by the RTS,S/AS01 candidate (1). This is also the most popular approach for the development of blood-stage vaccines for which antibody-mediated immunity is widely regarded as the major protective mechanism. Gene-based vaccines have been in clinical trials for malaria since the assessment of NYVAC-Pf7 in the mid-1990s (2), and most recently, a major effort has been initiated on a third quite different approach, the development of whole-parasite vaccines (3), but the clinical assessment of such vaccines using deployable routes of administration has yet to begin. Moreover, there are concerns that even if successful, whole-parasite vaccines will likely require transportation and storage in liquid nitrogen vapor, limiting their deployability.
