title: Transcriptome patterns from primary cutaneous Leishmania braziliensis infections associate with eventual development of mucosal disease in humans.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Localized Cutaneous Leishmaniasis (LCL) and Mucosal Leishmaniasis (ML) are two extreme clinical forms of American Tegumentary Leishmaniasis that usually begin as solitary primary cutaneous lesions. Host and parasite factors that influence the progression of LCL to ML are not completely understood. In this manuscript, we compare the gene expression profiles of primary cutaneous lesions from patients who eventually developed ML to those that did not.
  
  
  METHODS
  Using RNA-seq, we analyzed both the human and Leishmania transcriptomes in primary cutaneous lesions.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Limited number of reads mapping to Leishmania transcripts were obtained. For human transcripts, compared to ML patients, lesions from LCL patients displayed a general multi-polarization of the adaptive immune response and showed up-regulation of genes involved in chemoattraction of innate immune cells and in antigen presentation. We also identified a potential transcriptional signature in the primary lesions that may predict long-term disease outcome.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  We were able to simultaneously sequence both human and Leishmania mRNA transcripts in primary cutaneous leishmaniasis lesions. Our results suggest an intrinsic difference in the immune capacity of LCL and ML patients. The findings correlate the complete cure of L. braziliensis infection with a controlled inflammatory response and a balanced activation of innate and adaptive immunity.
authors.affiliation: Division of Molecular Medicine, Department of Medicine, Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, Torrance, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Ana Claudia
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Maretti-Mira
authors.forename: Jaime
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Bittner
authors.forename: Manoel Paes
authors.initials: MP
authors.lastname: Oliveira-Neto
authors.forename: Minghsun
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Dezhi
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Kang
authors.forename: Huiying
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Claude
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Pirmez
authors.forename: Noah
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Craft
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions; D006801:Humans; D007892:Leishmania braziliensis / Q000235:genetics / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D016773:Leishmaniasis, Cutaneous / Q000469:parasitology* / Q000473:pathology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D059467:Transcriptome; D055815:Young Adult