News for 'artemesia'

Coming soon: Cheap, miracle cure for malaria

Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, are relying on synthetic biology to produce sufficient amounts of a medicine based on an ancient Chinese herbal remedy, to protect over a million children who die each year from malaria. The drug called artemisinin is based on extracts from the Chinese plant Artemesia annua (sweet wormwood), which has been used in China to treat malaria since at least the second century BC.