Researched
Artemisinin
Tu Youyou isolated artemisinin from sweet wormwood in 1972 after China's Project 523 screened traditional remedies; artemisinin combinations became the main malaria treatment.
Open in the interactive tree →China's military Project 523 (1967) searched for a malaria drug. Tu Youyou, guided by a handbook by Ge Hong from about 340 CE that names sweet wormwood (Artemisia annua), found that a low-temperature extraction kept the active compound and isolated artemisinin in 1972. Combination drugs such as artemether-lumefantrine (Coartem) became first-line care; in 2006 the WHO called for an end to single-drug artemisinin products to slow resistance, which was first reported in western Cambodia in 2008. Tu Youyou shared the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Prerequisites
- Egyptian, Greek and Roman Medicine~400 BCA 4th-century Chinese handbook pointed to sweet wormwood.
- Germ Theory1861Knowing malaria is a parasite disease allowed screening in infected animals.
Unlocks
- Eradicating MalariaopenArtemisinin combinations are the backbone of treatment, and they are now failing in places.