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Full-Text Articles in Medicine and Health Sciences
Transgenic Mosquitoes Expressing A Phospholipase A(2) Gene Have A Fitness Advantage When Fed Plasmodium Falciparum-Infected Blood, Ryan C. Smith, Christopher Kizito, Jason L. Rasgon, Marcelo Jacobs-Lorena
Transgenic Mosquitoes Expressing A Phospholipase A(2) Gene Have A Fitness Advantage When Fed Plasmodium Falciparum-Infected Blood, Ryan C. Smith, Christopher Kizito, Jason L. Rasgon, Marcelo Jacobs-Lorena
Ryan C. Smith
Genetically modified mosquitoes have been proposed as an alternative strategy to reduce the heavy burden of malaria. In recent years, several proof-of-principle experiments have been performed that validate the idea that mosquitoes can be genetically modified to become refractory to malaria parasite development. We have created two transgenic lines of Anophelesstephensi, a natural vector of Plasmodium falciparum, which constitutively secrete a catalytically inactive phospholipase A2 (mPLA2) into the midgut lumen to interfere with Plasmodium ookinete invasion. Our experiments show that both transgenic lines expressing mPLA2 significantly impair the development of rodent malaria parasites, but only one line impairs the development …
Enterobacter-Activated Mosquito Immune Responses To Plasmodium Involve Activation Of Srpn6 In Anopheles Stephensi, Ryan C. Smith, Abraham G. Eappen, Marcelo Jacobs-Lorena
Enterobacter-Activated Mosquito Immune Responses To Plasmodium Involve Activation Of Srpn6 In Anopheles Stephensi, Ryan C. Smith, Abraham G. Eappen, Marcelo Jacobs-Lorena
Ryan C. Smith
Successful development of Plasmodium in the mosquito is essential for the transmission of malaria. A major bottleneck in parasite numbers occurs during midgut invasion, partly as a consequence of the complex interactions between the endogenous microbiota and the mosquito immune response. We previously identified SRPN6 as an immune component which restricts Plasmodium berghei development in the mosquito. Here we demonstrate that SRPN6 is differentially activated by bacteria in Anopheles stephensi, but only when bacteria exposure occurs on the lumenal surface of the midgut epithelium. Our data indicate that AsSRPN6 is strongly induced following exposure to Enterobacter cloacae, a common component …
Structural Basis For Enzyme I Inhibition By Α-Ketoglutarate, Vincenzo Venditti, Rodolfo Ghirlando, G. Marius Clore
Structural Basis For Enzyme I Inhibition By Α-Ketoglutarate, Vincenzo Venditti, Rodolfo Ghirlando, G. Marius Clore
Vincenzo Venditti
Creating new bacterial strains in which carbon and nitrogen metabolism are uncoupled is potentially very useful for optimizing yields of microbial produced chemicals from renewable carbon sources. However, the mechanisms that balance carbon and nitrogen consumption in bacteria are poorly understood. Recently, α-ketoglutarate (αKG), the carbon substrate for ammonia assimilation, has been observed to inhibit Escherichia coli enzyme I (EI), the first component of the bacterial phosphotransferase system (PTS), thereby providing a direct biochemical link between central carbon and nitrogen metabolism. Here we investigate the EI-αKG interaction by NMR and enzymatic assays. We show that αKG binds with a KD …
Structure, Dynamics And Biophysics Of The Cytoplasmic Protein–Protein Complexes Of The Bacterial Phosphoenolpyruvate: Sugar Phosphotransferase System, Vincenzo Venditti
Structure, Dynamics And Biophysics Of The Cytoplasmic Protein–Protein Complexes Of The Bacterial Phosphoenolpyruvate: Sugar Phosphotransferase System, Vincenzo Venditti
Vincenzo Venditti
The bacterial phosphotransferase system (PTS) couples phosphoryl transfer, via a series of bimolecular protein–protein interactions, to sugar transport across the membrane. The multitude of complexes in the PTS provides a paradigm for studying protein interactions, and for understanding how the same binding surface can specifically recognize a diverse array of targets. Fifteen years of work aimed at solving the solution structures of all soluble protein–protein complexes of the PTS has served as a test bed for developing NMR and integrated hybrid approaches to study larger complexes in solution and to probe transient, spectroscopically invisible states, including encounter complexes. We review …