title: Ensuring transmission through dynamic host environments: host-pathogen interactions in Plasmodium sexual development.
abstract: A renewed global commitment to malaria elimination lends urgency to understanding the biology of Plasmodium transmission stages. Recent progress toward uncovering the mechanisms underlying Plasmodium falciparum sexual differentiation and maturation reveals potential targets for transmission-blocking drugs and vaccines. The identification of parasite factors that alter sexual differentiation, including extracellular vesicles and a master transcriptional regulator, suggest that parasites make epigenetically controlled developmental decisions based on environmental cues. New insights into sexual development, especially host cell remodeling and sequestration in the bone marrow, highlight open questions regarding parasite homing to the tissue, transmigration across the vascular endothelium, and maturation in the parenchyma. Novel molecular and translational tools will provide further opportunities to define host-parasite interactions and design effective transmission-blocking therapeutics.
authors: Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
authors: Kathleen W
authors: KW
authors: Dantzler
authors: Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
authors: Deepali B
authors: DB
authors: Ravel
authors: Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
authors: Nicolas Mb
authors: NM
authors: Brancucci
authors: Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA 02115, USA. Electronic address: mmarti@hsph.harvard.edu.
authors: Matthias
authors: M
authors: Marti
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D044127:Epigenesis, Genetic; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions; D006801:Humans; D010963:Plasmodium falciparum / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology*