[Excerpt] Early and accurate malaria diagnosis is critical for the disease control and elimination [1].
Microscopy and/or immuno-rapid tests remain the standard diagnosis [2, 3], nevertheless it
requires a skin puncture for blood sampling and not sensitive enough for reliable detect lowdensity parasitemias, urging the need to develop more sensitive and non-invasive tools.
Symptoms of the disease starts when parasites infect the red blood cell (RBC), suffering
biochemical and morphological changes [4]. Parasite survival is dependent on hemozoin (Hz)
formation as a by-product of heme detoxification process of the parasite upon haemoglobin
(Hb) degradation and therefore a good unique feature to identify parasites presence in
patients’.
Taking advantage of the fact that the Hz and Hb molar extinction coefficients differ significantly,
especially at certain wavelengths [4, 5], and their proportion is inversely related upon parasite
maturation inside the RBC, each stage of malaria is characterized by specific absorbance and
reflectance spectra, according to the Hb/Hz concentrations on the iRBC. [...]Work supported by project NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-028178, funded by NORTE 2020 Portugal Regional Operational Programme, under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund and by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), IP
