Red blood cell tension protects against severe malaria in the Dantu blood group.

ABSTRACT: Malaria has had a major effect on the human genome, with many protective polymorphisms-such as the sickle-cell trait-having been selected to high frequencies in malaria-endemic regions^1,2. The blood group variant Dantu provides 74% protection against all forms of severe malaria in homozygous individuals^3-5, a similar degree of protection to that afforded by the sickle-cell trait and considerably greater than that offered by the best malaria vaccine. Until now, however, the protective mechanism has been unknown. Here we demonstrate the effect of Dantu on the ability of the merozoite form of the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum to invade red blood cells (RBCs). We find that Dantu is associated with extensive changes to the repertoire of proteins found on the RBC s

SUBMITTER: Kariuki SN 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7116803 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature