Gorillas may be key to malaria mystery

2010/10/01

MALARIA appears to have jumped to humans from gorillas, and the parasite may have spread globally from a single gorilla to a single human, researchers report.

DNA from the droppings of nearly 3000 apes – gorillas, chimpanzees and bonobos – shows the strain of malaria parasite most common in humans is virtually identical to one of many strains that infects gorillas.

Beatrice Hahn, of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and colleagues used ape droppings collected to study the origins of the Aids virus for their study, published in the journal Nature.

Hahn’s team looked for DNA from malaria parasites, including the Plasmodium falciparum parasite that causes most human cases.

“Wild apes, in particular the common chimps and the western gorillas, are naturally infected with at least eight or nine different Plasmodium species,” Hahn said. For years chimps were the chief suspects. But Hahn’s data shows only gorillas are infected by a Plasmodium species virtually identical on the genetic level to the type that infects humans. The findings could have implications for efforts to get rid of malaria, said Dr Larry Slutsker, who heads the malaria programme at the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

“If we were trying to rid the planet of every last parasite and there was a reservoir in western gorillas, that would have implications for eradication. I don’t think we are there, obviously,” he said. — BY MAGGIE FOX Reuters

http://www.dispatch.co.za/article.aspx?id=437111
(Submitted by Chad Arment)

Gorillas may be key to malaria mystery

2010/10/01

MALARIA appears to have jumped to humans from gorillas, and the parasite may have spread globally from a single gorilla to a single human, researchers report.

DNA from the droppings of nearly 3000 apes – gorillas, chimpanzees and bonobos – shows the strain of malaria parasite most common in humans is virtually identical to one of many strains that infects gorillas.

Beatrice Hahn, of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and colleagues used ape droppings collected to study the origins of the Aids virus for their study, published in the journal Nature.

Hahn’s team looked for DNA from malaria parasites, including the Plasmodium falciparum parasite that causes most human cases.

“Wild apes, in particular the common chimps and the western gorillas, are naturally infected with at least eight or nine different Plasmodium species,” Hahn said. For years chimps were the chief suspects. But Hahn’s data shows only gorillas are infected by a Plasmodium species virtually identical on the genetic level to the type that infects humans. The findings could have implications for efforts to get rid of malaria, said Dr Larry Slutsker, who heads the malaria programme at the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

“If we were trying to rid the planet of every last parasite and there was a reservoir in western gorillas, that would have implications for eradication. I don’t think we are there, obviously,” he said. — BY MAGGIE FOX Reuters

http://www.dispatch.co.za/article.aspx?id=437111
(Submitted by Chad Arment)

Cologne Zoo's newest addition

Jul 14 - Cologne Zoo proudly shows off its newest member, a bonobo baby. Gemma Haines reports.



http://www.reuters.com/news/video?rpc=401&videoId=119265205

Baby bonobos tragic victims of illegal trading

May 2010: A three-month-old bonobo has become yet another tragic victim of the illegal trade in the endangered creatures.

A man called Jean Efoko had bought the baby and another 12-month-old bonobo from a hunter near the Bandundu province of Congo, with the aim of selling them in the markets of Kinshasa.

However, the young animals were not strong enough for the journey. Worried about their health, Jean asked a driver for Doctors Without Borders who told him to take them to the Lola va Bonobo sanctuary.

Jean was unaware that bonobos are endangered and that it is illegal to sell them. However, having been shown round the centre by an education officer, Jean gave up the bonobos.

However, the two infants were in bad shape and two of the youngest bonobos the sanctuary has seen. They were severely malnourished and traumatised and sadly the three-month-old was too weak to survive.

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/bonobos-illegal-trade.html

So, how do you make a gorilla stew?

YOU keep him waiting for three hours. And if you told that joke in Africa, you'd get more hearty laughs than in Asia. Naturalists have discovered orang-utans and other Asian apes laugh less than their African cousins, such as gorillas and chimps. And they also found that, while humans first learned to laugh from their ape ancestors millions of years ago, we have since learned to use laughter to sneer, mock and ridicule.

'Our observations showed strong differences in the use of laughter between the Asian great apes (orang-utans) and the African great apes (gorillas, chimpanzees and bonobos),' said Dr Marina Davila Ross, of the UK's University of Portsmouth.

'Asian apes and humans laugh clearly more often.'

Evolution has enabled humans to use laughter to mock others while apes simply laugh to enjoy themselves and influence others, she concluded.

'But something happened in the last 5 million years which means humans use laughter for a much wider range of situations.'

Dr Ross, who worked with the University of Veterinary Medicine in Germany, also showed sounds other than laughter can evolve in the context of tickling. Mammals, including flying foxes, make sounds when they are tickled but they are not necessarily laughing.

Metro Ireland, 12 January 2010, p5.