Regulators of male and female sexual development are critical for the transmission of a malaria parasite.

ABSTRACT: Malaria transmission to mosquitoes requires a developmental switch in asexually dividing blood-stage parasites to sexual reproduction. In Plasmodium berghei, the transcription factor AP2-G is required and sufficient for this switch, but how a particular sex is determined in a haploid parasite remains unknown. Using a global screen of barcoded mutants, we here identify genes essential for the formation of either male or female sexual forms and validate their importance for transmission. High-resolution single-cell transcriptomics of ten mutant parasites portrays the developmental bifurcation and reveals a regulatory cascade of putative gene functions in the determination and subsequent differentiation of each sex. A male-determining gene with a LOTUS/OST-HTH domain as well as the protein in

SUBMITTER: Russell AJC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7616090 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature