The structure of an important malarial protein has been determined.

http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-01-scientist...n-essential-survival.html

Not sure about malaria, but I know methylene blue is excreted out of the body -- it give you blue urine!!! -- try that on a premed student!!!

http://www.sciencecodex.com/read/notre_dame_r...l_malaria_discovery-84661

Notre Dame researchers report fundamental malaria discovery

A team of researchers led by Kasturi Haldar and Souvik Bhattacharjee of the University of Notre Dame's Center for Rare and Neglected Diseases has made a fundamental discovery in understanding how malaria parasites cause deadly disease. The researchers show how parasites target proteins to the surface of the red blood cell that enables sticking to and blocking blood vessels. [...] Malaria is a blood disease that kills nearly 1 million people each year. It is caused by a parasite that infects red cells in the blood. Once inside the cell, the parasite exports proteins beyond its own plasma membrane border into the blood cell. These proteins function as adhesins that help the infected red blood cells stick to the walls of blood vessels in the brain and cause cerebral malaria, a deadly form of the disease that kills over half a million children each year. In all cells, proteins are made in a specialized cell compartment called the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) from where they are delivered to other parts of the cell. [... The researchers discovered that] for host-targeted malaria proteins the very first step is binding to the lipid phosphatidylinositol 3-phosphate, PI(3)P, in the ER. This was surprising for two reasons. Previous studies suggested an enzyme called Plasmepsin V that released the proteins into the ER was also the export mechanism. However, Haldar, Bhattacharjee and colleagues discovered that binding to PI(3)P lipid which occurs first is the gate keeper to control export and that export can occur without Plasmepsin V action. Further, in higher eukaryotic cells (such as in humans), the lipid PI(3)P is not usually found within the ER membrane but rather is exposed to the cellular cytoplasm. [...]

Malaria kills twice as many people as thought.

The number of people who die annually of the tropical disease is double the current estimate, according to the report published in the science journal Lancet.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/...2/03/gIQAhUDZnQ_blog.html

Drug-Resistant Malaria Is Spreading, and It Could Be a Public Health Disaster

Probably, the closest thing we have to a miracle drug for Malaria is the Chinese-developed plant-derived drug, Artemisinin.

But, unfortunately, an Artemisinin-resistant malaria parasites that first emerged in Cambodia in 2006 is spreading quickly and can now be found in Thailand. If the resistant parasites spread to sub-Saharan Africa the cost could be "millions" of human lives.

The website Time.com has more on the story at this link:

http://healthland.time.com/2012/04/06/drug-re...a-public-health-disaster/