Angiostrongylus cantonensis is an important causative agent of eosinophilic
meningitis and eosinophilic
meningoencephalitis in
humans.
MicroRNAs (
miRNAs) are small non-
coding RNAs that participate in a wide range of
biological processes. This study employed a deep-sequencing approach to study
miRNAs from
young adults of A. cantonensis. Based on 16,880,456 high-quality reads, 252 conserved mature
miRNAs including 10 antisense
miRNAs that
belonging to 90
families, together with 10 antisense
miRNAs were identified and characterised. Among these sequences, 53
miRNAs from 25
families displayed 50 or more reads. The conserved
miRNA families were divided into four groups according to their phylogenetic distribution and a total of nine
families without any members showing homology to other nematodes or
adult worms were identified.
Stem-loop
real-time polymerase chain reaction analysis of aca-miR-1-1 and aca-miR-71-1 demonstrated that their level of expression increased dramatically from infective
larvae to
young adults and then decreased in
adult worms, with the
male worms exhibiting significantly higher levels of expression than
female worms. These findings provide information related to the
regulation of gene expression during the
growth, development and
pathogenesis of
young adults of A. cantonensis.