Last Updated: 16/07/2025
Mechanism of regulation of key pathogenic gene expression of Plasmodium falciparum
Objectives
*The title and abstract were machine translated from Mandarin
This study, based upon gene knockout parasite, eg. PfSETvs, in which all the var genes were expressed, aims to explore the regulation of chromatin interactions directed by histone modifications, the functional complex of the var gene-derived antisense lncRNAs and their related factors, and the interaction pattern of different transcriptional factors that broadly regulate expression of var genes.
Plasmodium falciparum is the deadliest form of human malaria, a parasitic infectious disease causing devastating consequence. After infection of human host, this parasite is able to control the antigenic variation by adopting a mutually exclusive expression strategy for those variant gene families such as var, rif and stevor, then evade human immune responses and establish a chronic infection. Thus, this gene expression mode is the basis of immune evasion and pathogenesis of this parasite, however, it still remains unclear how malaria parasites achieves this strategy in host. Meanwhile, this will establish and elucidate the molecular regulation network controlling mutually exclusive expression of the var, rif and stevor gene families using systems biology research tools. The belief is that these findings will contribute to understanding the mechanisms of antigenic variation and pathogenesis, and to the development of effective malaria vaccines and novel anti-malarial drugs by providing new targets for malaria prevention and treatment.
Jan 2017 — Dec 2021
$413,508
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