The structure and function of nematode pathogenicity islands

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Parasitic nematode worms are some of the most abundant parasites on the planet - it is normal for animals and plants to be infected with them. Nematode worms infect about a quarter of people on the planet, mainly the young and poor in the developing world. They are also important parasites of livestock, and continued production of meat, milk, wool etc. requires controlling these parasites.Despite the ubiquity and importance of these parasites, we don't understand how they harm their hosts. Specifically, we don't understand what genes they use to live inside their hosts and to feed on them, but it is this which ultimately harms hosts. If we understand more about these genes we could better predict how these might evolve and we could think about new ways to better control these parasites, which we need to do to protect human and animal health, and to secure food production.We have discovered 12 concentrated sets of genes that we think control infection by a parasitic nematode. Looking at our pilot data we see that these sets of genes differ a lot among different individual worms and we think this is a tell-tale sign that the worms are using these sets of genes to compete with one another inside the host, and that this competition is driving the harm that these parasites cause to their hosts.We are now proposing to investigate these sets of genes is more detail, to very precisely understand how they differ among individual worms, and to see whether or not different genetic types naturally occur together inside a host. By looking at the gene sequences we'll also predict which worms should be most different from each other in how they infect hosts, and then we'll test this in experiments with laboratory animals. In this way our work will move from just comparing gene sequences to also testing how nematode worms actually infect hosts. We will study this in a nematode parasite called Strongyloides that naturally infects rats in the UK, but which we can also study in the lab.By testing our ides we will establish whether or not we have discovered the sets of genes that parasitic nematodes use to infect hosts. If so, this opens up a whole new understanding of how nematode worms infect and cause harm to their hosts, which can then be used to better understand, predict and treat these infections in the future.