Neglected Tropical diseases

Neglected tropical diseases are serious diseases that affect many people in tropical countries and which have been relatively little studied. The World Health Organisation lists the following as neglected tropical diseases: trachoma, leprosy, schistosomiasis, soil transmitted helminths, lymphatic filariasis, onchocerciasis, Buruli ulcer, yaws, Chagas disease, African trypanosomiasis, leishmaniasis, Dengue fever, rabies, Dracunculiasis (guinea-worm disease), and Fascioliasis (see http://www.who.int/neglected_diseases/diseases/en/).

The genomes of many of the organisms that cause neglected tropical diseases have been fully sequenced, or are currently being sequenced, including:

• the bacterium Chlamydia trachomatis, which causes trachoma
• the bacterium Mycobacterium leprae, which causes leprosy
• the bacterium Mycobacterium ulcerans, which causes Buruli ulcer
• the bacterium Treponema pallidum subsp. pertenue, which causes yaws
• the protist Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes Chagas disease
• the protist Trypanosoma brucei, which causes African trypanosomiasis
• the protist Leishmania major, and related Leishmania species, which cause leishmaniasis
• the schistosome worm Schistosoma mansoni, which causes schistosomiasis
• the nematode worms Brugia malayi and Wuchereria bancrofti, which cause lymphatic filariasis
• the nematode worm Loa loa, which causes subcutaneous filariasis
• the nematode worm Onchocerca volvulus, which causes onchocerciasis
• the nematode worm Necator americanus, which causes soil-transmitted helminthiasis
• the Dengue virus, which causes Dengue fever
• the Rabies virus, which causes Rabies

To encourage research into these organisms, many of the examples in this booklet are based on analysing these genomes.

Contact

I will be grateful if you will send me (Avril Coghlan) corrections or suggestions for improvements to my email address alc@sanger.ac.uk

License

The content in this book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.