Generation of a Mouse Model of Experimental Cerebral Malaria Using Host Mosquito-Derived Sporozoites

Begin by collecting female mosquitoes from their cage 17 to 22 days after the blood meal. Use forceps to place 3 to 4 mosquitoes on a glass slide covered with a drop of cold RPMI medium. Then, place the slide under a microscope.

Carefully stretch the mosquito between the head and body with forceps, and use a syringe and needle to isolate the salivary gland. Next, collect the salivary glands from the glass slide by sucking them up with a glass pipette, and transferring them into a 1.5-milliliter centrifuge tube. Then, use a small plastic stick to smash the isolated salivary glands within the centrifuge tube for three minutes in order to isolate the sporozoites from the salivary gland tissue.

Centrifuge for three minutes at 1,000 times g in 4 degrees Celsius to purify the sporozoites from the remaining tissue. Pipette the supernatant, which contains the sporozoites, to a new centrifuge tube, and count the purified sporozoites in a Neubauer hemocytometer. Sporozoites show a typical counter-clockwise movement.

Next, adjust the concentration of the purified sporozoites to 10,000 per milliliter by adding phosphate-buffered saline. Finally, place a C57BL6 mouse in a restrainer, and put its tail into warm water to better visualize the tail vein. Then, inject a total of 1,000 sporozoites, or 0.1 milliliters, into the tail vein to initiate infection.