蓝氏贾第鞭毛虫表面抗原变异机制研究进展

Research Progress on the Mechanisms of Antigenic Variation in Giardia lamblia

蓝氏贾第鞭毛虫(Giardia lamblia,简称贾第虫)是引起腹泻的最常见的肠道寄生原虫之一。同大多数肠道寄生的病原体一样,表面抗原(variant-specific surface proteins,VSPs)变异是虫体逃避宿主免疫攻击的重要机制,从而导致疾病慢性化和/或重复感染的发生。本文将从基因水平的调控、转录和转录后调控、VSPs表达修饰调节和VSPs的加工、处理与转运等4个方面对贾第虫表面抗原变异机制的研究进展进行综述。

The intestinal protozoan parasite Giardia lamblia is one of the most common causes of diarrhoea and undergoes antigenic variation. In pathogenic microorganisms, antigenic variation is often described as a mechanism to evade the host immune system, resulting in chronic and/or recurrent infections. In the recent years, significant advances in the knowledge of the antigen switching process have been achieved. Here we review the principal knowledge on the mechanisms that regulate this process, including genomic organization, post-tanscriptional gene silencing, expressional modifications, and processing and turnover of VSPs.