title: Reconstruction and flux-balance analysis of the Plasmodium falciparum metabolic network.
abstract: Genome-scale metabolic reconstructions can serve as important tools for hypothesis generation and high-throughput data integration. Here, we present a metabolic network reconstruction and flux-balance analysis (FBA) of Plasmodium falciparum, the primary agent of malaria. The compartmentalized metabolic network accounts for 1001 reactions and 616 metabolites. Enzyme-gene associations were established for 366 genes and 75% of all enzymatic reactions. Compared with other microbes, the P. falciparum metabolic network contains a relatively high number of essential genes, suggesting little redundancy of the parasite metabolism. The model was able to reproduce phenotypes of experimental gene knockout and drug inhibition assays with up to 90% accuracy. Moreover, using constraints based on gene-expression data, the model was able to predict the direction of concentration changes for external metabolites with 70% accuracy. Using FBA of the reconstructed network, we identified 40 enzymatic drug targets (i.e. in silico essential genes), with no or very low sequence identity to human proteins. To demonstrate that the model can be used to make clinically relevant predictions, we experimentally tested one of the identified drug targets, nicotinate mononucleotide adenylyltransferase, using a recently discovered small-molecule inhibitor.
authors.affiliation: Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, Columbia University, New York City, NY 10032, USA.
authors.forename: Germán
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Plata
authors.forename: Tzu-Lin
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Hsiao
authors.forename: Kellen L
authors.initials: KL
authors.lastname: Olszewski
authors.forename: Manuel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Llinás
authors.forename: Dennis
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Vitkup
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D053858:Metabolic Networks and Pathways; D010963:Plasmodium falciparum / Q000378:metabolism*
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