Ito Kumpei, Tateishi Yuki S, Imai Takashi, Miyazaki Shinya, Miyazaki Yukiko, Kagaya Wataru, Nakashima Mai, Sase Miho, Yoshioka-Takeda Misato, Shimokawa Chikako, Hayashi Kyoko, Itokawa Kentaro, Komagata Osamu, Ngo-Thanh Ha, Shimo Aoi, Araki Tamasa, Annoura Takeshi, Murakami Takashi, Hisaeda Hajime
Department of Parasitology, National Institute of Infectious Diseases (NIID), Japan Institute for Health Security (JIHS), Tokyo 162-0052, Japan.
Department of Infectious Diseases and Host Defense, Gunma University, Maebashi 371-8511, Japan.
Vaccines (Basel). 2025 Sep 21;13(9):988. doi: 10.3390/vaccines13090988.
Erythroblasts have recently been identified as host cells for malarial parasites, revealing a previously underappreciated host-parasite interaction. However, their extremely low abundance in peripheral blood has hindered progress, especially in elucidating the biological significance of parasitized erythroblasts (pEBs) .
Here, we visualized pEBs in a murine model and established a method to increase their number in peripheral blood by immunizing mice with live 17XNL, followed by challenge with ANKA.
Immunized mice were protected from cerebral malaria and survived longer, during which pEBs appeared in circulation and were detected using Giemsa-stained smears. All blood-stage parasite forms were identified within pEBs, including enucleating erythroblasts.
This model enables / analysis of pEB biology without bone marrow/spleen isolation, thus lowering technical/ethical barriers for the field.
近期已确定成红细胞是疟原虫的宿主细胞，揭示了一种此前未得到充分认识的宿主 - 寄生虫相互作用。然而，它们在外周血中的丰度极低，阻碍了研究进展，尤其是在阐明被寄生红细胞（pEBs）的生物学意义方面。
在此，我们在小鼠模型中对pEBs进行了可视化，并建立了一种方法，通过用活的17XNL免疫小鼠，随后用ANKA攻击，来增加外周血中pEBs的数量。
免疫小鼠免受脑型疟疾感染，存活时间更长，在此期间pEBs出现在循环中，并通过吉姆萨染色涂片检测到。在pEBs内鉴定出了所有血液阶段的寄生虫形式，包括去核的成红细胞。
该模型无需分离骨髓/脾脏就能对pEB生物学进行分析，从而降低了该领域的技术/伦理障碍。
