Abstract: Irradiation-attenuated sporozoites are still the most effective pre-erythrocytic malaria vaccine. However， limitation of purified sporozoites and difficulty in attenuation controlling of sporozoites hamper its use in practice. Understand-ing the mechanism of protective immunity induced by irradiation-attenuated sporozoites will be helpful for the design of the efficient pre-erythrocytic malaria vaccine. This is a review on research progress in the mechanism of protective immunity induced by irradiation-attenuated sporozoites and current status of pre-erythrocytic malaria vaccine development.

Key words: Irradiation-attenuated sporozoite, Plasmodium, Vaccine, Protective immunity