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Assessment of genetic diversity of Plasmodium falciparum circumsporozoite protein in Sudan: the RTS,S leading malaria vaccine candidate
by
Ali, Mohamed S.
,
Abubakr, Mustafa
,
Mohammed, Yassir Osman
in
Amino acids
,
Biomedical and Life Sciences
,
Biomedicine
2021
Background
The currently used malaria vaccine, RTS,S, is designed based on the
Plasmodium falciparum
circumsporozoite protein (PfCSP). The
pfcsp
gene, besides having different polymorphic patterns, can vary between
P. falciparum
isolates due to geographical origin and host immune response. Such aspects are essential when considering the deployment of the RTS,S vaccine in a certain region. Therefore, this study assessed the genetic diversity of
P. falciparum
in Sudan based on the
pfcsp
gene by investigating the diversity at the N-terminal, central repeat, and the C-terminal regions.
Methods
A cross-sectional molecular study was conducted;
P. falciparum
isolates were collected from different health centres in Khartoum State between January and December 2019. During the study period, a total of 261 febrile patients were recruited. Malaria diagnosis was made by expert microscopists using Giemsa-stained thick and thin blood films. DNA samples were examined by the semi-nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Single clonal infection of the confirmed
P. falciparum
cases, were used to amplify the
pfcsp
gene. The amplified amplicons of
pfcsp
have been sequenced using the Sanger dideoxy method. The obtained sequences of
pfcsp
nucleotide diversity parameters including the numbers of haplotypes (Hap), haplotypes diversity (Hapd), the average number of nucleotide differences between two sequences (p), and the numbers of segregating sites (S) were obtained. The haplotype networks were constructed using the online tcsBU software. Natural selection theory was also tested on
pfcsp
using Fuand Li’s D, Fuand Li’s F statistics, and Tajima’s D test using DnaSP.
Results
In comparison with the different
pfcsp
reference strains, the Sudanese isolates showed high similarity with other African isolates. The results of the N-terminal region showed the presence of 2 different haplotypes with a Hapd of 0.425 ± 0.00727. The presence of the unique insertion of NNNGDNGREGKDEDKRDGNN was reported. The KLKQP motif was conserved in all the studied isolates. At the central repeat region, 11 haplotypes were seen with a Hapd of 0.779 ± 0.00097. The analysis of the genetic diversity in the C-terminal region showed the presence of 10 haplotypes with a Hapd of 0.457 ± 0.073. Several non-synonymous amino acids changes were also seen at the Th2R and the Th3R T-cell epitope regions including T317K, E317K, Q318E, K321N, I322K, T322K, R322K, K324Q, I327L, G352N, S354P, R355K, N356D, Q357E, and E361A.
Conclusions
In this study, the results indicated a high conservation at the
pfcsp
gene. This may further contribute in understanding the genetic polymorphisms of
P. falciparum
prior to the deployment of the RTS,S vaccine in Sudan.
Journal Article