LSTM PhD student Ako Victorien Constant Edi has been designated a prize winner at the University of Liverpool postgraduate research Online Poster Day. His poster, entitled: "A population of Anopheles mosquitoes from Ivory Coast resistant to all classes of insecticides available for malaria control" reports on the discovery of a population of Anopholes gambiae mosquitoes, in the Ivory Coast, that are resistant to all four available insecticide classes. This multiple resistance is effectively nullifying current insecticide resistance management strategies and presents a severe threat to local vector-targeted malaria control. It is unlikely that this problem will remain specific to this location for long and these results now available to the wider scientific community will inform malaria control programmes.
Poster Day Online is a world-wide event for students to present their research to a wider academic audience, independently of their location, and to gain feedback from peers and research staff in their own and other disciplines. The online format allows researchers who are primarily based overseas to participate and in doing so bring country specific research to an international audience.
Ako is a PhD student in LSTM’s Vector Biology Department, led by Professor Hilary Ranson, specifically part ofAvecNet (African Vector Control: New Tools), an EC FP7 funded collaborative project between African and European Researchers to develop and evaluate new tools for malaria control in Africa. Working with AvecNet partner Centre Suisse de Recherches Scientifiques en Côte d'Ivoire (CSRS), Ako’s initial field work has already demonstrated exceptionally high levels of resistance to the majority of World Health Organization approved insecticides in malaria vectors in the Ivory Coast. He is using molecular techniques to investigate the causes of this resistance and hopefully eventually study the link between resistance and the capacity of mosquitoes to transmit malaria in this region.
His research poster presents an insight into this work for his PhD, entitled: “Mechanisms underlying multiple insecticide resistance in southern Cote d’Ivoire”. Research that is supporting the genetics of multiple insecticide resistance in mosquitoes transmitting malaria in the Ivory Coast and its impact on current control strategies.