Cristian Koepfli, Sonja Schoepflin, Michael Bretscher, Enmoore Lin, Benson Kiniboro, Peter A. Zimmerman, Peter Siba, Thomas A. Smith, Ivo Mueller, Ingrid Felger

In malaria endemic areas, most people are simultaneously infected with different parasite clones. Detection of individual clones is hampered when their densities fluctuate around the detection limit and, in case of P. falciparum, by sequestration during part of their life cycle. This has important implications for measures of levels of infection or for the outcome of clinical trials. This study aimed at measuring the detectability of individual P. falciparum and P. vivax parasite clones in consecutive samples of the same patient and at investigating the impact of sampling strategies on basic epidemiological measures such as multiplicity of infection (MOI).