What's new for 'Trypanosomatids' in PubMed

This message contains My NCBI what's new results from the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) at the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM).
Do not reply directly to this message.

Sender's message:

Sent on Wednesday, 2009 Dec 02
Search kinetoplastids OR kinetoplastid OR Kinetoplastida OR "trypanosoma brucei" OR leishmania OR brucei OR leishmaniasis OR "African trypanosomiasis"
Click here to view complete results in PubMed. (Results may change over time.)
To unsubscribe from these e-mail updates click here.

PubMed Results

Items 1 -3 of 3

1.	J Cell Biol. 2009 Nov 23. [Epub ahead of print] Kinesin 9 family members perform separate functions in the trypanosome flagellum. Demonchy R, Blisnick T, Deprez C, Toutirais G, Loussert C, Marande W, Grellier P, Bastin P, Kohl L. Adaptation Processes of Protozoa to their Environment, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique FRE3206 and 2 Nucleic acids: Dynamics, Targeting and Biological Functions, UMR5153, Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, 75231 Paris, France. Numerous eukaryote genome projects have uncovered a variety of kinesins of unknown function. The kinesin 9 family is limited to flagellated species. Our phylogenetic experiments revealed two subfamilies: KIF9A (including Chlamydomonas reinhardtii KLP1) and KIF9B (including human KIF6). The function of KIF9A and KIF9B was investigated in the protist Trypanosoma brucei that possesses a single motile flagellum. KIF9A and KIF9B are strongly associated with the cytoskeleton and are required for motility. KIF9A is localized exclusively in the axoneme, and its depletion leads to altered motility without visible structural modifications. KIF9B is found in both the axoneme and the basal body, and is essential for the assembly of the paraflagellar rod (PFR), a large extra-axonemal structure. In the absence of KIF9B, cells grow abnormal flagella with excessively large blocks of PFR-like material that alternate with regions where only the axoneme is present. The functional diversity of the kinesin 9 family illustrates the capacity for adaptation of organisms to suit specific cytoskeletal requirements.
	PMID: 19948486 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

2.	Clin Infect Dis. 2009 Nov 30. [Epub ahead of print] Detection and Species Identification of Leishmania DNA from Filter Paper Lesion Impressions for Patients with American Cutaneous Leishmaniasis. Boggild AK, Valencia BM, Espinosa D, Veland N, Ramos AP, Arevalo J, Llanos-Cuentas A, Low DE. Tropical Disease Unit, Division of Infectious Diseases, Toronto General Hospital, 2Laboratories Branch, Ontario Agency for Health Protection and Promotion, Etobicoke, and 3Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada; 4Instituto de Medicina Tropical "Alexander von Humboldt," 5Departamento de Bioquimica, Biologia Molecular y Farmacologia, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, and 6Hospital Nacional Cayetano Heredia, Lima, Peru. Background. Traditional detection of Leishmania from ulcers involves collection of invasive specimens that cause discomfort, require technical expertise, and carry risks of invasive procedures. We compared traditional diagnostic methods with a molecular noninvasive filter paper-based method for the diagnosis of cutaneous leishmaniasis. Methods. Consecutive patients presenting to the Leishmania Clinic at Hospital Nacional Cayetano Heredia were enrolled. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was performed on lesion scrapings, aspirates, and filter paper impressions. The reference standard was any 2 of 5 tests positive: smear, aspirate culture, invasive-specimen PCR (scrapings and aspirates), filter paper PCR, and leishmanin skin test. Outcome measures were sensitivity and specificity. Leishmania speciation was performed by PCR-restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) of positive specimens. Results. Forty-five patients with 66 lesions were enrolled. Of 52 lesions diagnosed as cutaneous leishmaniasis, 50 were positive by PCR of invasive specimens versus 48 by PCR of filter papers ([Formula: see text]). Sensitivity and specificity of PCR on invasively obtained specimens were 94.2% (95% confidence interval [CI], 87.9%-100%) and 92.9% (95% CI, 79.4%-100%). Sensitivity and specificity of filter paper PCR were 92.3% (95% CI, 85.1%-99.5%) and 100%. Culture, smear, and leishmanin skin test all had inferior sensitivities, compared with PCR of invasive or noninvasive specimens ([Formula: see text]). Of 50 specimens positive by PCR, 19 had sufficient DNA for PCR-RFLP analysis. Conclusions. Filter paper PCR constitutes a sensitive and specific alternative to traditional diagnostic assays. This novel, rapid, well-tolerated method has the potential for widespread use in the field and in pediatric populations where traditional specimen collection is most difficult to perform, and can potentially be used for rapid species identification.
	PMID: 19947858 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

3.	J Proteome Res. 2009 Nov 30. [Epub ahead of print] Trypano-PPI: A Web Server for Prediction of Unique Targets in Trypanosome Proteome by using Electrostatic Parameters of Protein-Protein Interactions. Rodriguez-Soca Y, Munteanu CR, Prado-Prado FJ, Dorado J, Pazos Sierra A, Gonzalez-Diaz H. Trypanosoma brucei causes African trypanosomiasis in human (HAT or African sleeping sickness) and Nagana in cattle. The disease threatens over 60 million people and uncounted numbers of cattle in 36 countries of sub-Saharan Africa and has a devastating impact on human health and the economy. On the other hand, Trypanosoma cruzi is responsible in South America for Chagas disease, which can cause acute illness and death, especially in young children. In this context, the discovery of novel drug targets in Trypanosome proteome is a major focus for the scientific community. Recently, many researchers have spent important efforts on the study of Protein-Protein Interactions (PPIs) in pathogen Trypanosome species concluding that the low sequence identities between some parasite proteins and its human host render these PPIs as highly promising drug targets. However, until the best of our knowledge there are not general models to predict Unique PPIs in Trypanosome (TPPIs). On the other hand, the 3D structure of an increasing number of Trypanosome proteins is being reported in databases. In this sense, the introduction of a new model to predict TPPIs from the 3D structure of proteins involved in PPI is very important. For this purpose, we introduce new protein-protein complex invariants based the Markov average electrostatic potential xik(Ri) for amino acids located in different regions (Ri) of i-th protein and placed at distance k each other. We calculate more than 30 different types of parameters to 7866 pairs of proteins (1023 TPPIs and 6823 non-TPPIs) from more than 20 organisms, including parasites and human or cattle hosts. We found a very simple linear model that predicts above 90% of TPPIs and non-TPPIs both in training and independent test sub-sets using only two parameters. The parameters were xik(s) = |xik(s1) - xik(s2)| which are the absolute difference between the xik(si) values on the surface of the two proteins of the pairs. We also tested non-linear ANN models for comparison purposes but the linear mode gives the better results. We implemented this predictor in the web server named TrypanoPPI freely available to public at http://miaja.tic.udc.es/Bio-AIMS/TrypanoPPI.php. This is the first model that predicts how unique is a protein-protein complex in Trypanosome proteome with respect to other parasites and host opening new opportunities for anti-trypanosome drug target discovery.
	PMID: 19947655 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]