A research team from the University of Hyderabad has developed a medicine that efficiently kills the plasmodium falciparum parasite that causes malaria.

A release from the varsity said that the polymer-based nanomedicine was developed by a research group led by Pradip Paik, Associate Professor of the School of Engineering Sciences and Technology at the University of Hyderabad.Prof Paik said that the new formulation was efficient in killing Plasmodium falciparum infection in red blood cells and added that the medicine could now be used for animal trials.

Prof Paik is currently on assignment as Associate Professor of the School of Biomedical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology (BHU), Varanasi.The World Health Organisation estimates that malaria, one of the deadliest scourges of mankind, afflicts about 212 million people every year and causes 4,29,000 deaths annually.