Characterisation of the vacuolar compartment of malaria parasites within human red blood cells

恶性疟原虫血液阶段是疟疾病理学的原因。在这个生命周期阶段，寄生虫在红细胞内发育，被称为寄生虫空泡膜（PVM）的额外膜包围。这种膜代表寄生虫和宿主细胞之间的界面，因此对寄生虫的细胞内存活起着核心作用。尽管这个隔间的重要性，很少有人知道它的生物起源和蛋白质组成。因此，我们将使用成像技术在红细胞中的寄生虫发育过程中观察这一隔室，并将使用一种新的方法确定其蛋白质组。然后将蛋白质组与红细胞中的不同生命周期阶段相关联，以揭示寄生虫的特定功能。我们期望，该项目不仅将定义这一重要隔室的特征，而且还将找到已知活动的长期寻求的分子基础，例如PVM中的主要溶质孔。此外，我们希望发现新的，迄今未知的功能PVM，也可能是普遍相关的了解其他病原体的细胞内生存。

Plasmodium falciparum blood stages are responsible for the pathology of malaria. In this live cycle phase the parasite develops within red blood cells, surrounded by an extra membrane termed the parasitophorour vacuolar membrane (PVM). This membrane represents the interface between the parasite and the host cell and therefore plays a central role for the intracellular survival of the parasite. Despite of the importance of this compartment, little is known about its biogenesis and its protein composition. We will therefore characterise this compartment across the development of the parasite in red blood cells using imaging and will determine its proteome using a new approach. The proteom will then be correlated with the different life cycle phases in the red blood cell in order to reveal specific functions for the parasite. We expect that this project will not only define the characteristics of this important compartment but also to find the long sought molecular basis for known activities, such as for instance the major solute pore in the PVM. Moreover, we expect to discover new, so far unknown functions of the PVM that may also be of general relevance to understand intracellular survival of other pathogens.