Imaging dynamics of Plasmodium CSP

Session

Poster Session 1

Authors

Carolina Thieleke-Matos (2), Mirko Singer (1), Kevin Walz (2), Sylvia Munter (2, 3), Freddy Frischknecht (2)

Affiliations

1. Experimental Parasitology, Department for Veterinary Sciences, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, Munich, Germany
2. Integrative Parasitology, Center for Infectious Diseases, Heidelberg University Medical School, Im Neuenheimer Feld 344, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany
3. Infectious Diseases Imaging Platform, Center for Infectious Diseases, Heidelberg University Medical School, Im Neuenheimer Feld 344, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany

Keywords

Malaria, orbital-TIRF, live imaging

Abstract text

CSP is the most abundant protein on the surface of Plasmodium sporozoites and the target of the most advanced, yet not highly efficient, subunit malaria vaccine, RTS,S. CSP is essential for sporozoite formation, entry into both mosquito salivary glands and mammalian livers and contains several domains including a central repeat. Antibodies against this repeat can stop sporozoite migration in the skin and liver cell entry. During migration CSP is shed into membraneous trails that are left on the substrate. To understand the dynamics of CSP during sporozoite formation (1) and migration we generated several transgenic Plasmodium berghei parasite lines expressing the circumsporozoite protein fused internally to a green fluorescent protein. This allowed visualization of CSP during sporozoite development and motility using orbital-TIRF microscopy and may provide a new assay system to characterize anti-CSP antibodies.

References

(1) Singer M and Frischknecht F (2021) Fluorescent tagging of Plasmodium circumsporozoite protein allows imaging of sporozoite formation but blocks egress from oocysts. Cellular Microbiology, 23: e13321.