Cardoso-Jaime Victor, Dimopoulos George
W. Harry Feinstone Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, Malaria Research Institute, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA.
Nat Commun. 2025 Feb 8;16(1):1465. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-56313-y.
For successful transmission, the malaria parasite must traverse tissue epithelia and survive attack from the insect's innate immune system. Hemocytes play a multitude of roles in mosquitoes, including defense against invading pathogens. Here, we show that hemocytes of the major malaria vector Anopheles gambiae promote Plasmodium falciparum infection by maintaining midgut epithelial integrity by controlling cell proliferation upon blood feeding. The mosquito's hemocytes also control the midgut microbiota and immune gene expression. Our study unveils novel hemocyte functions that are exploited by the human malaria parasite to evade the mosquito's immune system.
为实现成功传播，疟原虫必须穿过组织上皮，并在昆虫先天免疫系统的攻击下存活下来。血细胞在蚊子中发挥着多种作用，包括抵御入侵病原体。在这里，我们表明，主要疟疾传播媒介冈比亚按蚊的血细胞通过在吸血时控制细胞增殖来维持中肠上皮完整性，从而促进恶性疟原虫的感染。蚊子的血细胞还控制中肠微生物群和免疫基因表达。我们的研究揭示了人类疟原虫利用的新型血细胞功能，以逃避蚊子的免疫系统。
