Understanding the genetic basis of reproductive strategy in a parasitic nematode system

胃肠道寄生线虫是一种重要的寄生虫，感染全球约6亿人。这些寄生虫具有独特的生命周期，非常适合于理解生殖的遗传和表观遗传基础。类圆线虫的生活周期在寄生的成年雌性世代和自由生活的有性生殖的雄性和雌性世代之间交替。孤雌生殖成虫的后代发育成雌性感染性‘iL3’幼虫(这将继续感染新的宿主)或发育成具有有性繁殖能力的成虫。所有有性生殖的成虫所生的后代都是iL3。重要的是，交错世代的成年雌性在基因上是相同的，并且都会产生iL3后代，这为比较生殖策略提供了一个理想的实验室模型。这个项目将调查来自孤雌生殖和有性生殖的成年雌性胚胎的差异，以了解生殖生物学的基本原理。我们假设，来自不同生殖策略的胚胎(I)成为寄生虫的能力不同。才能成功感染宿主。(Ii)在不同水平表达基因、转座元件和小RNA。(Iii)和(Ii)直接受到环境因素的影响，如温度、免疫压力暴露、饮食限制和他们所接触的微生物群落的组成。本项目将结合实验室和生物信息学技术来检验这些假设。学生将接受该项目所有方面的全面培训，如寄生虫培养和生物学，RNAseq和Small-RNAseq等测序方法，以及序列数据的生物信息学分析。这名学生将受益于一支拥有不同专业知识的导师团队。该项目将与东京大学的菊内太成合作实施，作为学习和培训的一部分，该学生将有机会访问日本。应聘者必须具有对寄生虫学、线虫、生殖生物学和/或遗传学感兴趣的学士学位或硕士学位。

The gastrointestinal parasitic nematode, Strongyloides, is an important parasite that infects ~600 million people globally.These parasites have a unique lifecycle that is ideally suited to understanding the genetic and epigenetic basis ofreproduction. The Strongyloides lifecycle alternates between a parasitic adult female generation that reproduces byparthenogenesis and a free-living sexually reproducing male and female generation. The offspring of parthenogenic adultsdevelop into female infective 'iL3' larvae (that will go on to infect a new host) or larvae that develop into sexuallyreproducing adults. All offspring produced by sexually reproducing adults are iL3s. Importantly, adult females in alternategenerations are genetically identical, and both produce iL3 offspring, offering an ideal laboratory model to comparereproductive strategies. This project will investigate differences in the embryos derived from parthenogenic and sexuallyreproducing adult females to understand fundamental principles about reproductive biology. We hypothesise that embryos derived from different reproductive strategies (i) differ in their ability to be a parasitee.g. to successfully infect a host. (ii) express genes, transposable elements and small RNAs at different levels. (iii) and(ii) is directly affected by environmental factors such as temperature, exposure to immune stress, dietary restrictions,and composition of microbial communities they are exposed to.This project will test these hypotheses using a combination of laboratory and bioinformatic skills. The student willreceive full training in all aspects of the project such as parasite culturing and biology, sequencing methods such asRNAseq and small-RNAseq, and bioinformatic analysis of sequence data. The student will benefit from a team ofsupervisors with diverse expertise.This project will be carried out in collaboration with Taisei Kikuchi (University of Tokyo), and the student will haveopportunities to visit Japan as part of their studies and training. Applicants should have a strong first degree or masterswith an interest in parasitology, nematodes, reproductive biology and/or genetics