Project description:Prymnesium parvum is regarded as one of the most notorious harmful algal bloom (HAB) species worldwide. In recent years, it has frequently formed toxic blooms in coastal and brackish waters of America, Europe, Australia, Africa and Asia, causing large-scale mortalities of wild and cultured fish and other gill-breathing animals. In the last decade, blooms of P. parvum have expanded to inland fresh waters in the USA, presumably due to changes in environmental conditions. The aim of the experiment was to establish the gill transcriptomic responses to P. parvum in rainbow trout. We used 2 different concentrations of P. parvum and identified fish with low and moderate responses to the algae. Based on the dose of and the fish response, fish were classified into 4 groups with high exposure/moderate response (HM), high exposure/low response (HL), low exposure/low response (LL) and control group (C) with no exposure/no response. Gene expression profiling of the gill tissue was performed using a microarray platform developed and validated for rainbow trout.
Project description:Cryptosporidium parvum is an important zoonotic parasitic disease worldwide, but the molecular mechanisms of the host–parasite interaction are not fully understood. Noncoding microRNAs (miRNAs) are considered key regulators of parasitic diseases. Therefore, we used microarray, qPCR, and bioinformatic analyses to investigate the intestinal epithelial miRNA expression profile after Cryptosporidium parvum infection.Twenty miRNAs were differentially expressed after infection (four upregulated and 16 downregulated). Further analysis of the differentially expressed miRNAs revealed that many important cellular responses were triggered by Cryptosporidium parvum infection, including cell apoptosis and the inflammatory and immune responses.This study demonstrates for the first time that the miRNA expression profile of human intestinal epithelium cells is altered by C. parvum infection. This dysregulation of miRNA expression may contribute to the regulation of host biological processes in response to C. parvum infection, including cell apoptosis and the immune responses. These results provide new insight into the regulatory mechanisms of host miRNAs during cryptosporidiosis, which may offer potential targets for future C. parvum control strategies.
Project description:To investigate whether C. parvum treatment of DCs regulates other inflammatory genes, mouse BMDCs (CD11c and CD11b positive) were treated with C. parvum for 24 hr. Control groups included untreated BMDCs and DCs treated with E. cuniculi. We noticed that a significant upregulation of the expression of interferon-related genes, which may correlation the critical role of interferon in host defense against C. parvum infection. DCs were treated with C. parvum for 24 hr. Control groups included untreated BMDCs and DCs treated with E. cuniculi. Group comparison was performed using the data of 3 replicate arrays from each time point.