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Eukaryotic Cell, April 2009, p. 640-648, Vol. 8, No. 4
1535-9778/09/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/EC.00347-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Disruption of Plasmodium Sporozoite Transmission by Depletion of Sporozoite Invasion-Associated Protein 1{triangledown} ,§

Sabine Engelmann,1,{dagger} Olivier Silvie,1,2,{dagger} and Kai Matuschewski1,2*

Department of Parasitology, Heidelberg University School of Medicine, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany,1 Parasitology Unit, Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology, 10117 Berlin, Germany2

Received 16 October 2008/ Accepted 15 January 2009

Accumulation of infectious Plasmodium sporozoites in Anopheles spp. salivary glands marks the final step of the complex development of the malaria parasite in the insect vector. Sporozoites are formed inside midgut-associated oocysts and actively egress into the mosquito hemocoel. Traversal of the salivary gland acinar cells correlates with the sporozoite's capacity to perform continuous gliding motility. Here, we characterized the cellular role of the Plasmodium berghei sporozoite invasion-associated protein 1 (SIAP-1). Intriguingly, SIAP-1 orthologs are found exclusively in apicomplexan hemoprotozoa, parasites that are transmitted by arthropod vectors, e.g., Plasmodium, Babesia, and Theileria species. By fluorescent tagging with mCherry, we show that SIAP-1 is expressed in oocyst-derived and salivary gland-associated sporozoites, where it accumulates at the apical tip. Targeted disruption of SIAP-1 does not affect sporozoite formation but causes a partial defect in sporozoite egress from oocysts and abolishes sporozoite colonization of mosquito salivary glands. Parasites with the siap-1(–) mutation are blocked in their capacity to perform continuous gliding motility. We propose that arthropod-transmitted apicomplexan parasites specifically express secretory factors, such as SIAP-1, that mediate efficient oocyst exit and migration to the salivary glands.

* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Parasitology Unit, Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology, Charitéplatz 1, 10117 Berlin, Germany. Phone: 49-30-28460535. Fax: 49-30-28460225. E-mail: matuschewski{at}mpiib-berlin.mpg.de

{triangledown} Published ahead of print on 30 January 2009.

§ Supplemental material for this article may be found at http://ec.asm.org/.

{dagger} These authors contributed equally.

Eukaryotic Cell, April 2009, p. 640-648, Vol. 8, No. 4
1535-9778/09/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/EC.00347-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.





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