The Leishmania mexicana A600 genes are functionally required for amastigote replication.

Leishmania parasites, the causative agent of leishmaniasis, have a digenetic lifecycle consisting of the morphologically distinct insect vector stage (promastigote) and the mammalian infective amastigote stage. Differentiation of promastigotes to the amastigote stage involves significant morphological and biochemical changes, however, very few genes have been characterised as being differentially expressed in the two stages. The Leishmania A600 genes are one of the few gene families that exhibit stage-specific expression and, as such, they are of interest as potential virulent factors. In this study, we characterize the A600 family in several Leishmania species and investigate their role in amastigote differentiation and proliferation. Four open reading frames, A600-1, A600-2, A600-3, and A600-4, were identified at the multi-gene L. mexicana A600 locus via cloning and restriction mapping. Homology searching identified A600 homologues in other Leishmania species, L. major, L. braziliensis and L. infantum but not in the closely related Trypanosoma family. A targeted gene deletion approach was utilized to determine the cellular function of the L. mexicanaA600 genes. A600(-/-) promastigotes differentiated to axenic amastigotes in response to temperature shift and acidification of culture media, but showed significant growth arrest. Similarly, during in vitro macrophage infection studies, A600(-/-) promastigotes established an early infection, but were deficient in their ability to proliferate as intracellular amastigotes. The ability of A600(-/-) amastigotes to proliferate in mouse peritoneal macrophages was restored by re-introduction of the A600-1 gene, but not the A600-4 gene. The results from these experiments show that the A600-1 gene is essential for continued proliferation of amastigotes, and potentially for development of chronic leishmaniasis. Furthermore, these results suggest a potential role for the L. mexicana A600-deficient mutant as a vaccine candidate.

Low-frequency changes in finger volume in patients after surgery, related to respiration and venous pressure.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: In patients after surgery, we observed large-amplitude low-frequency changes in digital plethysmograph measurements when DC coupling of the signal was used. We set out to assess factors that might contribute to these events and in particular to test the possibility that low-frequency signals could be used to assess respiratory disturbances. METHODS: We recorded values in 23 patients who had undergone gynaecological surgery. We measured nasal flow, abdominal pressure (by urinary catheter), venous pressure in the hand, and DC-coupled optical transmission plethysmography. Signals were replayed and analysed to assess the incidence of specific patterns of events. RESULTS: Most patients received morphine for postoperative analgesia. Respiratory irregularity and expiratory muscle action were very frequent. Increases in abdominal pressure during expiration caused increases in venous pressure and pulsation. In 12 out of 23 patients, a characteristic response consistent with vasoconstriction was noted after increases in breath size, and, in seven patients, very-low-frequency (0.2-0.7 Hz) oscillations of finger volume were present that appeared unrelated to respiratory events. Patients who did not receive morphine had very different plethysmograph patterns, with significantly smaller pulse amplitude. CONCLUSION: Low-frequency changes in finger volume can be simply obtained and provide considerable information about peripheral circulatory dynamics. Diverse patterns can be recognized, but the range of responses suggests that current techniques cannot be used alone to assess cardiorespiratory status. However, a combination of plethysmography with respiratory measurements shows characteristic events.

Regions in the 3' untranslated region confer stage-specific expression to the Leishmania mexicana a600-4 gene.

Protozoan parasites of the genus Leishmania have a digenetic lifecycle, alternating between the promastigote and amastigote stages. The extracellular promastigote resides within a sandfly vector, while the obligate intracellular amastigote stage replicates in the phagolysosome of mammalian host macrophages. Adaptation to and survival within these vastly differently environments is accompanied by differential expression of a subset of genes, which is regulated post-transcriptionally via cis-acting elements in 3' untranslated region (3'UTR) or intercistronic sequences. It was reported previously that Leishmania mexicana A600-4 mRNA transcript abundance was eight-fold higher in the amastigotes. In this study, chimeric luciferase:A600-4 3'UTR reporter constructs were integrated at the A600 chromosome locus to identify regulatory regions of the A600-4 3'UTR sequence. Evidence is provided for distinct 3'UTR elements that function to stabilize the A600-4 mRNA transcript in the amastigote stage and to regulate translation efficiency, respectively.

Genomic and proteomic expression analysis of Leishmania promastigote and amastigote life stages: the Leishmania genome is constitutively expressed.

Leishmania are protozoan parasites that cause a wide spectrum of clinical diseases in humans and are a major public health risk in several countries. Leishmania life cycle consists of an extracellular flagellated promastigote stage within the midgut of a sandfly vector, and a morphological distinct intracellular amastigote stage within macrophages of a mammalian host. This study reports the use of DNA oligonucleotide genome microarrays representing 8160 genes to analyze the mRNA expression profiles of L. major promastigotes and lesion derived amastigotes. Over 94% of the genes were expressed in both life stages. Advanced statistical analysis identified a surprisingly low degree of differential mRNA expression: 1.4% of the total genes in amastigotes and 1.5% in promastigotes. These microarray results demonstrate that the L. major genome is essentially constitutively expressed in both life stages and suggest that Leishmania is constitutively adapted for survival and replication in either the sandfly vector or macrophage host utilizing an appropriate set of genes for each vastly different environment. Quantitative proteomics, using the isotope coded affinity tag (ICAT) technology and mass spectrometry, was used to identify L. infantum promastigote and axenic amastigote differentially expressed proteins. Of the 91 distinct proteins identified, 8% were differentially expressed in the amastigote stage, 20% were differentially expressed in the promastigote stage, and the remaining 72% were considered constitutively expressed. The differential expression was validated by the identification of previously reported stage specific proteins and identified several amastigote and promastigote novel stage specific proteins.

Development of a recombinant Leishmania major strain sensitive to ganciclovir and 5-fluorocytosine for use as a live vaccine challenge in clinical trials.

To provide a safer live challenge strain for use in clinical vaccine trials, a double drug sensitive strain of Leishmania major was derived using advances in gene targeting technology by stably introducing into the chromosome a modified HSV-1 thymidine kinase gene (tk), conferring increased sensitivity to ganciclovir (GCV), and a Saccharomyces cerevisiae cytosine deaminase gene (cd), conferring sensitivity to 5-fluorocytosine (5-FC). In vitro studies showed that the homozygous L. major (tk-cd+/+) promastigotes were killed by either drug alone, and together the drugs acted synergistically. In vivo infection studies showed that progressively growing lesions in BALB/c mice, caused by L. major (tk-cd+/+), were completely cured by 2 weeks of treatment with either drug alone or in combination. Treated animals showed no signs of reoccurrence of infection for at least 4 months when the experiments were terminated.

Hyperhomocysteinemia due to methionine synthase deficiency, cblG: structure of the MTR gene, genotype diversity, and recognition of a common mutation, P1173L.

Mutations in the MTR gene, which encodes methionine synthase on human chromosome 1p43, result in the methylcobalamin deficiency G (cblG) disorder, which is characterized by homocystinuria, hyperhomocysteinemia, and hypomethioninemia. To investigate the molecular basis of the disorder, we have characterized the structure of the MTR gene, thereby identifying exon-intron boundaries. This enabled amplification of each of the 33 exons of the gene, from genomic DNA from a panel of 21 patients with cblG. Thirteen novel mutations were identified. These included five deletions (c.12-13delGC, c.381delA, c.2101delT, c.2669-2670delTG, and c.2796-2800delAAGTC) and two nonsense mutations (R585X and E1204X) that would result in synthesis of truncated proteins that lack portions critical for enzyme function. One mutation was identified that resulted in conversion of A to C of the invariant A of the 3' splice site of intron 9. Five missense mutations (A410P, S437Y, S450H, H595P, and I804T) were identified. The latter mutations, as well as the splice-site mutation, were not detected in a panel of 50 anonymous DNA samples, suggesting that these sequence changes are not polymorphisms present in the general population. In addition, a previously described missense mutation, P1173L, was detected in 16 patients in an expanded panel of 24 patients with cblG. Analysis of haplotypes constructed using sequence polymorphisms identified within the MTR gene demonstrated that this mutation, a C-->T transition in a CpG island, has occurred on at least two separate genetic backgrounds.