Figure 4: A comparison of the parasitaemia and survival of mice infected with WT and mutated strains.

(a) A comparison of the mean parasitaemia with standard variations of the mice that were infected with WT P. berghei, ΔPbTatD, PbTatD-D352A and PbTatD-com parasites from day 1–20 after infection. The parasitaemia in mice that were infected with either ΔPbTatD (red line) or PbTatD-D352A (green line) was lower than in mice infected with WT (black line) or PbTatD-com parasites (blue line). The error bars indicate s.d. (b) The curves representing the survival rates of the mice that were infected with WT, ΔPbTatD, PbTatD-D352A and PbTatD-com strains. The mice that were infected with the WT exhibited 100% death 11 days after IP injection with 10⁶ infected RBCs. The PbTatD-com strain exhibited a similar result as WT, whereas the mice that were infected with the ΔPbTatD and PbTatD-D352A strains exhibited a twofold longer survival time.