Kharon Is Crucial for <i>Trypanosoma cruzi</i> Morphology but Does Not Impair In Vitro Infection.

ABSTRACT: Chagas disease, caused by Trypanosoma cruzi, is a neglected tropical disease with few options for treatment and no available vaccine. Deletion mutants for live attenuated vaccines, particularly deletions of proteins related to the cytoskeleton, have been widely tested in related parasites but candidates have not been tested in T. cruzi. Kharon is one such protein, identified as being associated with the cytoskeleton in Leishmania and essential for amastigote replication. Here we investigated the T. cruzi Kharon ortholog (TcKharon) to test if it has orthologous function and thus potential in generating a live attenuated vaccine. In silico analysis predicted TcKharon to be an intrinsically disordered protein, consistent with its ortholog feature, and

SUBMITTER: Saenz-Garcia JL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12030701 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature