According to MediLexicon International's article, A 10-year project involving more than 140 scientists around the world has resulted in the successful sequencing of the genetic code of the tsetse fly "Glossina morsitans". The fly is the sole carrier of African sleeping sickness or trypanosomiasis, a disease that threatens millions of people across sub-Saharan Africa and devastates livestock. An estimated 70 million people in across sub-Saharan Africa are at risk for sleeping sickness, which occurs in two stages.
The first stage of infection causes fever, headaches, aching joints and itching. The second stage, when the parasite crosses the blood-brain barrier, causes confusion, poor co-ordination and the sleep problems that give the disease its name. Without treatment, African sleeping sickness is fatal. Also, diagnosis and treatment are difficult, and require specially trained staff to administer them. And while drugs exist, they are expensive and have many undesirable side effects. In livestock, trypanosome infection causes anemia and weight loss, which can lead to death. The result is billions of dollars of livestock lost every year. Although the infection is not found in the United States, historically, it has been a serious public health problem in some regions of sub-Saharan Africa (Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan). By unraveling the genetic code of the tsetse fly, researchers have essentially produced a "parts list" of the organism. The blueprint contains codes for all the 12,000 genes that control protein activity in the fly. Giving scientists access to the blueprint is expected to speed up research into the fly's unusual biology and lead to new methods and strategies for controlling the fly.
It is interesting to read how the tsetse fly genome comprises around 366 million letters of code, which is about one tenth of the size of the human genome. Its also unique in that unlike other flies the tsetse only gives birth to few offspring at a time, and each fly only yields a small amount of genetic material. Tsetse fly is highly unusual among insects in that they have developed unique partnerships with bacteria for several aspects of their biology, and they give birth to live young that have developed to a large size by feeding on specialised glands in the mother. It's exdrodinary how sleepiness sickness is caused by microscopic parasites of the species Trypanosoma brucei. It is hoped the genome map of the tsetse fly will help scientists understand more about evolutionary biology.
For more information on the parasites that cause sleeping sickness via flies, you can vist http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/our-work/medical-issues/sleeping-sickness
This was an interesting article, and you did a good job highlighting the main points. You mentioned that the infection is not found in the United States, and hopefully with these new findings it will never be spread to the U.S. This disease seems very serious and harmful, so if this research helps to prevent this disease from spreading that would be very beneficial.
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