A New Assessment of Thioester-Containing Proteins Diversity of the Freshwater Snail Biomphalaria glabrata

Type Article
Date 2020-01
Language English
Author(s) Duval David1, Pichon Rémi1, Lassalle Damien1, Laffitte Maud1, Gourbal Benjamain1, Galinier Richard1
Affiliation(s) 1 : IHPE, Université de. Montpellier, CNRS, Ifremer, Université de Perpignan Via Domitia, 66860 Perpignan, France
Source Genes (2073-4425) (MDPI AG), 2020-01 , Vol. 11 , N. 1 , P. 69 (16p.)
DOI 10.3390/genes11010069
WOS© Times Cited 14
Note This article belongs to the Special Issue Invertebrate Immunity
Keyword(s) Biomphalaria glabrata, Thioester-containing protein, alternative splicing, immunity, Schistosome
Abstract

Thioester-containing proteins (TEPs) superfamily is known to play important innate immune functions in a wide range of animal phyla. TEPs are involved in recognition, and in the direct or mediated killing of several invading organisms or pathogens. While several TEPs have been identified in many invertebrates, only one TEP (named BgTEP) has been previously characterized in the freshwater snail, Biomphalaria glabrata. As the presence of a single member of that family is particularly intriguing, transcriptomic data and the recently published genome were used to explore the presence of other BgTEP related genes in B. glabrata. Ten other TEP members have been reported and classified into different subfamilies: Three complement-like factors (BgC3-1 to BgC3-3), one α-2-macroblobulin (BgA2M), two macroglobulin complement-related proteins (BgMCR1, BgMCR2), one CD109 (BgCD109), and three insect TEP (BgTEP2 to BgTEP4) in addition to the previously characterized BgTEP that we renamed BgTEP1. This is the first report on such a level of TEP diversity and of the presence of macroglobulin complement-related proteins (MCR) in mollusks. Gene structure analysis revealed alternative splicing in the highly variable region of three members (BgA2M, BgCD109, and BgTEP2) with a particularly unexpected diversity for BgTEP2. Finally, different gene expression profiles tend to indicate specific functions for such novel family members.

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