Figure 2

Relationship between gametocyte abundance measured by LM, MF and RTPCR. Panel A: LM gametocyte density is plotted vs MF gametocyte density. The data are heavily left-censored since many observations cluster at the detection limit of LM. Therefore, a censored regression (Tobit model [25]) was used instead of standard linear regression, resulting in the depicted regression line. Panel B: LM gametocyte density is plotted vs Pfs25 and Pvs25 copy numbers. The black line is the best fit curve given by the Tobit regression. Panel C: MF gametocyte density is plotted over RTPCR transcript copy number. The continuous black line is the best fit by orthogonal regression. The dashed black line is the reference estimate from serially diluted strain 3D7 gametocyte cultures published by Wampfler et al.[21].