Identification of drug resistance gene using Plasmodium artificial chromosome

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26293091
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Partial Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Parasitology (including sanitary zoology)
• Research Institution: Mie University
• Principal Investigator: Iwanaga Shiroh 三重大学, 医学(系)研究科(研究院), 准教授 (20314510)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: マラリア / 薬剤耐性 / 人工染色体

Outline of Final Research Achievements

The global spread of drug-resistant Plasmodium falciparum is a major obstacle to malaria treatment. Identification of drug resistance genes is crucial to efforts aimed at fighting resistant parasites, but most of them have remained unclear. In this study, we attempted to identify mefloquine- and chloroquine-resistance genes by our developed method. Briefly, high-coverage genomic libraries of a drug-resistant strain are directly generated in drug-sensitive parasites using the centromere plasmid and an improved transfection technique, and the drug resistance gene is then robustly identified from these libraries by drug screening. We successfully used this approach to identify multi-drug-resistant transporter 7, an ATP-binding cassette transporter, as a novel mefloquine resistance gene from a field-isolated parasite strain. In addition, plasmepsin VI was identified as novel chloroquine-resistance gene candidate.

Free Research Field

寄生虫学