In Plasmodium falciparum, the causative agent of human malaria, the catalytic subunit gene of cAMP-dependent protein kinase (Pfpka-c ) exists as a single copy. Interestingly, its expression appears developmentally regulated, being at higher levels in the pathogenic asexual stages than in the sexual forms of parasite that are responsible for transmission to the mosquito vector. Within asexual parasites, PfPKA activity can be readily detected in schizonts. Similar to endogenous PKA activity of noninfected red blood cells, the parasite enzyme can be stimulated by cAMP and inhibited by protein kinase inhibitor. Importantly, ex vivo treatment of infected erythrocytes with the classical PKA-C inhibitor H89 leads to a block in parasite growth. This suggests that the PKA activities of infected red blood cells are essential for parasite multiplication. Finally, structural considerations suggest that drugs targeting the parasite, rather than the erythrocyte enzyme, might be developed that could help in the fight against malaria.Keywords: parasite; PKA; inhibition; H89.The emergence and dissemination of drug-resistant malaria parasites represents one of the most important public health problems in many parts of the world today. New antimalarials are urgently required, whose rational design and development requires the identification of potential therapeutic targets. This in turns rests on a better understanding of the molecular mechanisms controlling the progression of the complex life cycle of malaria parasites, especially Plasmodium falciparum, the species responsible for the lethal form of the disease. All Plasmodium species are intracellular parasites during infection of their vertebrate hosts. Sporozoites inoculated into a host during a bite by an infected Anopheles mosquito soon invade hepatocytes, within which intense asexual division takes place (exoerythrocytic schizogony), yielding up to 40 000 merozoites in the case of P. falciparum (http:// www.malaria.org). Upon schizont rupture, these merozoites invade red blood cells, where additional rounds of asexual replication occur (erythrocytic schizogony, the phase responsible for the pathogenesis of the disease). Some merozoites, instead of undergoing a further asexual cycle, arrest their cell cycle and differentiate into male or female gametocytes. Unlike asexual forms, these sexual forms are infective to the Anopheles vector.cAMP is involved in the regulation of development of several microorganisms, and cAMP-dependent pathways exist in most eukaryotic cells. For example, in the slime mold Dictyostelium discoideum, cAMP acts as a signal for the aggregation and differentiation of cells into a multicellular organism (reviewed in [1]). In most instances, cAMP exerts its action by binding to the regulatory subunit complexed to the catalytic subunit in an inactive holoenzyme of the protein kinase A (PKA or cAMPdependent protein kinase), thereby releasing the active catalytic subunit (PKA-C), whose substrates can include other protein kinases and transcription factors. P...