The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation

Malaria remains to be a global problem and has caused approximately 700,000 deaths per year. Plasmodium falciparum (P. falciparum) is a eukaryotic apicomplexan parasite and is one of the causative agents of malaria. The transcriptome of P. falciparum during the intraerythrocytic developmental cycle...

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Main Author: Lim, Eng How
Other Authors: Zbynek Bozdech
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: 2015
Subjects:
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10356/62533
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author Lim, Eng How
author2 Zbynek Bozdech
author_facet Zbynek Bozdech
Lim, Eng How
author_sort Lim, Eng How
collection NTU
description Malaria remains to be a global problem and has caused approximately 700,000 deaths per year. Plasmodium falciparum (P. falciparum) is a eukaryotic apicomplexan parasite and is one of the causative agents of malaria. The transcriptome of P. falciparum during the intraerythrocytic developmental cycle (IDC) is characterized by a highly regulated cascade of transcripts where 60-80% of the 5500 genes in the parasite genome are expressed at least once. However, mechanisms of transcriptional control are not well characterized in P. falciparum. In particular, there is a lack of functional cis-regulatory DNA motifs described in P. falciparum. We have utilized an algorithm to predict DNA motifs on co-regulated genes and tested their functionality by transfection assays. Interestingly, we have found an overrepresentation of motifs which repress transcription. We have also found that the repressive effects of several of motifs were stage specific and regulate transcription of groups of genes. Hence, this leads us to propose repression of transcription as a form of transcriptional regulation in P. falciparum.
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spelling ntu-10356/625332023-02-28T18:46:29Z The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation Lim, Eng How Zbynek Bozdech School of Biological Sciences DRNTU::Science::Biological sciences::Genetics Malaria remains to be a global problem and has caused approximately 700,000 deaths per year. Plasmodium falciparum (P. falciparum) is a eukaryotic apicomplexan parasite and is one of the causative agents of malaria. The transcriptome of P. falciparum during the intraerythrocytic developmental cycle (IDC) is characterized by a highly regulated cascade of transcripts where 60-80% of the 5500 genes in the parasite genome are expressed at least once. However, mechanisms of transcriptional control are not well characterized in P. falciparum. In particular, there is a lack of functional cis-regulatory DNA motifs described in P. falciparum. We have utilized an algorithm to predict DNA motifs on co-regulated genes and tested their functionality by transfection assays. Interestingly, we have found an overrepresentation of motifs which repress transcription. We have also found that the repressive effects of several of motifs were stage specific and regulate transcription of groups of genes. Hence, this leads us to propose repression of transcription as a form of transcriptional regulation in P. falciparum. DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (SBS) 2015-04-14T08:16:30Z 2015-04-14T08:16:30Z 2014 2014 Thesis Lim, E. H. (2014). The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation. Doctoral thesis, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. https://hdl.handle.net/10356/62533 10.32657/10356/62533 en 216 p. application/pdf
spellingShingle DRNTU::Science::Biological sciences::Genetics
Lim, Eng How
The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation
title The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation
title_full The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation
title_fullStr The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation
title_full_unstemmed The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation
title_short The role of cis-regulatory elements in Plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation
title_sort role of cis regulatory elements in plasmodium falciparum transcriptional regulation
topic DRNTU::Science::Biological sciences::Genetics
url https://hdl.handle.net/10356/62533
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