Leishmania manipulates sandfly feeding to enhance its transmission.
Malaria parasites manipulate mosquitoes to ensure transmission between mammalian hosts; painstaking experiments have now demonstrated that another medically important protozoan, Leishmania, enhances its transmission through the adaptive manipulation of one of its sandfly vectors, Lutzomyia longipalpis. Experimental Leishmania infections specifically increased sandfly biting persistence and feeding on multiple hosts, but only if the parasites produced infective forms and a gel plug of filamentous proteophosphoglycan in the anterior midgut of the sandfly. This fundamental research is relevant to vaccine development.
Ready
Paul D
PD
Department of Entomology, Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, UK. p.ready@nhm.ac.uk <p.ready@nhm.ac.uk>
D000222:Adaptation, Physiological; D000818:Animals; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D005247:Feeding Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006790:Host-Parasite Interactions / Q000502:physiology; D007303:Insect Vectors / Q000469:parasitology; D007891:Leishmania / Q000378:metabolism / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D007896:Leishmaniasis / Q000378:metabolism / Q000635:transmission*; D008565:Membrane Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D010273:Parasitic Diseases, Animal / Q000469:parasitology; D011509:Proteoglycans / Q000378:metabolism; D015800:Protozoan Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D011576:Psychodidae / Q000469:parasitology* / Q000502:physiology; D012376:Rodent Diseases / Q000469:parasitology
D008565:Membrane Proteins; C400527:Ppg1 protein, Leishmania; D011509:Proteoglycans; D015800:Protozoan Proteins