Project: Unconventional secretory pathways in Trichomonas vaginalis
Research group: Tachezy
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The secretion of virulence factors by parasitic protists into the host environment plays a fundamental role in multifactorial host–parasite interactions. Recently we analyzed secretome of T. vaginalis and identified 89 bona fide secreted proteins. Approximately half of them were predicted to possess transmembrane helixes and mainly include putative adhesins and leishmaniolysin-like metallopeptidases. The other half of soluble proteins includes several novel potential virulence factors. Interestingly, current bioinformatic tools predicted the secretory signal that is required for secretion via the classical endoplasmic reticulum-to-Golgi pathways in only 18% of the identified T. vaginalis-secreted proteins. Therefore, it seems that a number of proteins is secreted by other pathways, so called unconventional protein secretion (UPS) pathways. There are four type of UPSs: Type I „Plasma membrane pore formation“ , Type II include secretion via ABC transporters, Type III „Organelle-based translocation of leaderless proteins“, and Type IV „Bypassing the Golgi with Signal Peptide Containing Proteins“. This project will be focused on evaluation of UPSs in T. vaginalis protein secretion, particularly of Type III and IV. A combined molecular, parasitological and informatics approach will be taken to test the hypothesis that secretion is mediated in part by UPS pathways and that these represent evolutionary ancient pathways and in parasitic protists might be functionally more important than classical secretory pathways.
Deadline is closed