TY - JOUR
T1 - The plasmodium PHIST and RESA-like protein families of human and rodent malaria parasites
AU - Moreira, Cristina K.
AU - Naissant, Bernina
AU - Coppi, Alida
AU - Bennett, Brandy L.
AU - Aime, Elena
AU - Franke-Fayard, Blandine
AU - Janse, Chris J.
AU - Coppens, Isabelle
AU - Sinnis, Photini
AU - Templeton, Thomas J.
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank MR4 for providing us with anti-Pf39 immune serum; Dr. Brian Cooke for providing us with anti-SBP1 immune serum; and Leona Cohen-Gould for assistance at the Optical Microscopy core facility at Weill Cornell Medical College. Peptide synthesis was performed by the Proteomics Resource Center of the Rockefeller University. Pavitra Rao is sincerely thanked for critical reading of the manuscript. This investigation was supported by grant KL2RR024997 of the Clinical and Translational Science Center at Weill Cornell Medical College to Cristina Moreira, by NIH/NIAID grant 1R01AI080754-01A1 and the William Randolph Hearst Foundation to Thomas Templeton, and by NIH/NIAID grant R01AI056840 to Photini Sinnis.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Moreira et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2016/3/1
Y1 - 2016/3/1
N2 - The phist gene family has members identified across the Plasmodium genus, defined by the presence of a domain of roughly 150 amino acids having conserved aromatic residues and an all alpha-helical structure. The family is highly amplified in P. falciparum, with 65 predicted genes in the genome of the 3D7 isolate. In contrast, in the rodent malaria parasite P. berghei 3 genes are identified, one of which is an apparent pseudogene. Transcripts of the P. berghei phist genes are predominant in schizonts, whereas in P. falciparum transcript profiles span different asexual blood stages and gametocytes. We pursued targeted disruption of P. berghei phist genes in order to characterize a simplistic model for the expanded phist gene repertoire in P. falciparum. Unsuccessful attempts to disrupt P. berghei PBANKA-114540 suggest that this phist gene is essential, while knockout of phist PBANKA-122900 shows an apparent normal progression and non-essential function throughout the life cycle. Epitope-tagging of P. falciparum and P. berghei phist genes confirmed protein export to the erythrocyte cytoplasm and localization with a punctate pattern. Three P. berghei PEXEL/HT-positive exported proteins exhibit at least partial co-localization, in support of a common vesicular compartment in the cytoplasm of erythrocytes infected with rodent malaria parasites.
AB - The phist gene family has members identified across the Plasmodium genus, defined by the presence of a domain of roughly 150 amino acids having conserved aromatic residues and an all alpha-helical structure. The family is highly amplified in P. falciparum, with 65 predicted genes in the genome of the 3D7 isolate. In contrast, in the rodent malaria parasite P. berghei 3 genes are identified, one of which is an apparent pseudogene. Transcripts of the P. berghei phist genes are predominant in schizonts, whereas in P. falciparum transcript profiles span different asexual blood stages and gametocytes. We pursued targeted disruption of P. berghei phist genes in order to characterize a simplistic model for the expanded phist gene repertoire in P. falciparum. Unsuccessful attempts to disrupt P. berghei PBANKA-114540 suggest that this phist gene is essential, while knockout of phist PBANKA-122900 shows an apparent normal progression and non-essential function throughout the life cycle. Epitope-tagging of P. falciparum and P. berghei phist genes confirmed protein export to the erythrocyte cytoplasm and localization with a punctate pattern. Three P. berghei PEXEL/HT-positive exported proteins exhibit at least partial co-localization, in support of a common vesicular compartment in the cytoplasm of erythrocytes infected with rodent malaria parasites.
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U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0152510
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0152510
M3 - Article
C2 - 27022937
AN - SCOPUS:84962743572
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 11
JO - PloS one
JF - PloS one
IS - 3
M1 - e0152510
ER -