Lin Ruo-Hong, Lai De-Hua, Zheng Ling-Ling, Wu Jie, Lukeš Julius, Hide Geoff, Lun Zhao-Rong
Center for Parasitic Organisms, State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, School of Life Sciences and Key Laboratory of Tropical Diseases and Control of the Ministry of Education, Zhongshan School of Medicine, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, The People's Republic of China.
Key Laboratory of Gene Engineering of the Ministry of Education, State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, School of Life Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, 510275, The People's Republic of China.
Parasit Vectors. 2015 Dec 30;8:665. doi: 10.1186/s13071-015-1281-8.
The haemoflagellate Trypanosoma lewisi is a kinetoplastid parasite which, as it has been recently reported to cause human disease, deserves increased attention. Characteristic features of all kinetoplastid flagellates are a uniquely structured mitochondrial DNA or kinetoplast, comprised of a network of catenated DNA circles, and RNA editing of mitochondrial transcripts. The aim of this study was to describe the kinetoplast DNA of T. lewisi.
METHODS/RESULTS: In this study, purified kinetoplast DNA from T. lewisi was sequenced using high-throughput sequencing in combination with sequencing of PCR amplicons. This allowed the assembly of the T. lewisi kinetoplast maxicircle DNA, which is a homologue of the mitochondrial genome in other eukaryotes. The assembly of 23,745 bp comprises the non-coding and coding regions. Comparative analysis of the maxicircle sequence of T. lewisi with Trypanosoma cruzi, Trypanosoma rangeli, Trypanosoma brucei and Leishmania tarentolae revealed that it shares 78%, 77%, 74% and 66% sequence identity with these parasites, respectively. The high GC content in at least 9 maxicircle genes of T. lewisi (ATPase6; NADH dehydrogenase subunits ND3, ND7, ND8 and ND9; G-rich regions GR3 and GR4; cytochrome oxidase subunit COIII and ribosomal protein RPS12) implies that their products may be extensively edited. A detailed analysis of the non-coding region revealed that it contains numerous repeat motifs and palindromes.
We have sequenced and comprehensively annotated the kinetoplast maxicircle of T. lewisi. Our analysis reveals that T. lewisi is closely related to T. cruzi and T. brucei, and may share similar RNA editing patterns with them rather than with L. tarentolae. These findings provide novel insight into the biological features of this emerging human pathogen.
血液鞭毛虫路氏锥虫是一种动基体寄生虫，由于最近有报道称其可导致人类疾病，因此值得更多关注。所有动基体鞭毛虫的特征是具有独特结构的线粒体DNA或动基体，它由一系列连环DNA环组成网络，以及线粒体转录本的RNA编辑。本研究的目的是描述路氏锥虫的动基体DNA。
方法/结果：在本研究中，使用高通量测序结合PCR扩增子测序对纯化的路氏锥虫动基体DNA进行测序。这使得能够组装路氏锥虫动基体大环DNA，它是其他真核生物中线粒体基因组的同源物。23,745 bp的组装包含非编码区和编码区。将路氏锥虫的大环序列与克氏锥虫、兰氏锥虫、布氏锥虫和热带利什曼原虫进行比较分析，结果显示它与这些寄生虫的序列同一性分别为78%、77%、74%和66%。路氏锥虫至少9个大环基因（ATPase6；NADH脱氢酶亚基ND3、ND7、ND8和ND9；富含G的区域GR3和GR4；细胞色素氧化酶亚基COIII和核糖体蛋白RPS12）中的高GC含量表明其产物可能经过广泛编辑。对非编码区的详细分析表明，它包含许多重复基序和回文序列。
我们对路氏锥虫的动基体大环进行了测序并进行了全面注释。我们的分析表明，路氏锥虫与克氏锥虫和布氏锥虫密切相关，可能与它们共享相似的RNA编辑模式，而不是与热带利什曼原虫。这些发现为这种新出现的人类病原体的生物学特征提供了新的见解。
