A transcriptomic study on the pepsin-activated infective larvae of Angiostrongylus cantonensis.

Shih-Hsin Chang, Petrus Tang, Lian-Chen Wang

Graduate Institute of Biomedical Sciences, College of Medicine, Chang Gung University, Tao-Yuan 33332, Taiwan.

Molecular and biochemical parasitology 2011 Sep

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To investigate the pepsin-activated infective (third-stage) larvae of Angiostrongylus cantonensis at the transcriptomic level, 1496 ESTs were generated from a cDNA library and clustered into 161 contigs and 757 singletons. Among these unigenes, 54.5% had significant sequence homology with known proteins. The most abundantly expressed transcripts were cathepsin B-like cysteine protease 1 and 2, metalloprotease I, metalloprotease 1 precursor, and extracellular superoxide dismutase. Protein complex was the most common Gene Ontology classification within the 'cellular component' category, embryonic development ending in birth or egg hatching within 'biological process', and protein binding within 'molecular function'. Moreover, 280 clusters were mapped to 158 KEGG pathways and 134 had unique EC numbers. These findings suggest that treatment with pepsin-HCl not only digests the tissues of the snail host but also activates the infective larvae. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Citation

Shih-Hsin Chang, Petrus Tang, Lian-Chen Wang. A transcriptomic study on the pepsin-activated infective larvae of Angiostrongylus cantonensis. Molecular and biochemical parasitology. 2011 Sep;179(1):47-50