title: Crusade for iron: iron uptake in unicellular eukaryotes and its significance for virulence.
abstract: The effective acquisition of iron is a pre-requisite for survival of all organisms, especially parasites that have a high iron requirement. In mammals, iron homeostasis is meticulously regulated; extracellular free iron is essentially unavailable and host iron availability has a crucial role in the host-pathogen relationship. Therefore, pathogens use specialized and effective mechanisms to acquire iron. In this review, we summarize the iron-uptake systems in eukaryotic unicellular organisms with particular focus on the pathogenic species: Candida albicans, Tritrichomonas foetus, Trypanosoma brucei and Leishmania spp. We describe the diversity of their iron-uptake mechanisms and highlight the importance of the process for virulence.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology and Bosch Institute, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia.
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sutak
authors.forename: Emmanuel
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Lesuisse
authors.forename: Jan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tachezy
authors.forename: Des R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Richardson
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002176:Candida albicans / Q000378:metabolism / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D005057:Eukaryotic Cells / Q000166:cytology / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D007501:Iron / Q000378:metabolism*; D007891:Leishmania / Q000145:classification / Q000378:metabolism / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D016835:Tritrichomonas foetus / Q000378:metabolism / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D014346:Trypanosoma brucei brucei / Q000378:metabolism / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D014774:Virulence
chemical_list: D007501:Iron