This exhibition explored the challenges we face in fighting five of the most persistent parasites and the people who are fighting against them – from scientists and researchers in the laboratory to the local communities and workers on the front line. 

This hands-on exhibition invited you to build a parasite as you moved through the interactive displays, heard from scientists leading the fight, discovered the rules of working in a lab, and explored how to design drugs to tackle these diseases.

The exhibition focused on five tiny parasites that cause some of the most devastating diseases including malaria, schistosomiasis, leishmaniasis, sleeping sickness and guinea worm disease. These diseases affect 1 in every 18 people in the world. These five are among a range of diseases which the World Health Organization is aiming to eliminate, some as soon as 2020, with research centres in Dundee, Edinburgh and Glasgow at the forefront of these efforts. 

Presented in partnership with the Wellcome Centre for Anti-Infectives Research at the University of Dundee, Wellcome Centre for Integrative Parasitology at the University of Glasgow and Edinburgh infectious Diseases at the University of Edinburgh.