Abordagem proteômica para identificação de fatores de virulência em duas cepas de Leishmania infantum

Abstract

Leishmania infantum, synonymy with L. chagasi, is the protozoan responsible for Visceral Leishmaniasis in the Americas and Europe, a serious disease that can be fatal if untreated. Human cases range from subclinical infection, with an undetermined number of asymptomatic patients in endemic areas, a growing cadre of co-infection with HIV and high mortality in children. In dogs, the disease is severe, characterized by chronic and progressive cachexia, hepatosplenomegaly, lymphadenopathy, and pancytopenia onychogryphosis. However, less than 60% of the infected dogs present clinical signs of the disease, suggesting that host and parasitefactores are involved in clinical variability of disease. Thus, due to its importance and clinical and epidemiological diversity in our country, the study of virulence factors in L. (L.) infantum appears to be quite promising for understanding the host-parasite relationship. This study compared the differential expression of proteins between two strains of L. (L.) infantum (BH46 and BH400) with difference in virulence. Therefore, using two-dimensional electrophoresis and Differential Gel Electrophoresis (DIGE) will be assessed proteomic profiles of promastigote forms between different strains. These analyzes allowed us to select and identify proteins possibly related to the difference in virulence between strains BH46 and BH400, among them are the Tryparedoxin, S-Adenosyl homocysteine Hydrolase, HSP-70, Metallo-Peptidase, Clan MA(E) Family M3, Enolase, Phosphomannomutase, Peroxiredoxin, 14-3-3 protein like protein, GTP binding protein Rab 1 and KMP-11. Through the prediction of the network of interactions between the proteins was observed that often described as proteins involved in virulence interact with each other making important to study all overall organism protein complexes, and not only a protein individually. Thus, the characterization of factors involved in the virulence difference between BH46 and BH400 will enable a better understanding of the host-parasite relationship.