PfMORC protein regulates chromatin accessibility and transcriptional repression in the human malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum.

ABSTRACT: The environmental challenges the human malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum, faces during its progression into its various lifecycle stages warrant the use of effective and highly regulated access to chromatin for transcriptional regulation. Microrchidia (MORC) proteins have been implicated in DNA compaction and gene silencing across plant and animal kingdoms. Accumulating evidence has shed light into the role MORC protein plays as a transcriptional switch in apicomplexan parasites. In this study, using CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing tool along with complementary molecular and genomics approaches, we demonstrate that PfMORC not only modulates chromatin structure and heterochromatin formation throughout the parasite erythrocytic cycle, but is also essential to the parasite surv

SUBMITTER: Chahine Z 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10515874 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature