The British Society for Parasitology (BSP) holds a biannual symposium devoted to the kinetoplastids, and seeks to cover the full gamut of research into these important organisms, and alternates with the Woods Hole Kinetoplastid Molecular Cell Biology meeting that serves a similar community. While normally embedded within the main BSP Spring meeting, on several occasions the symposium has enjoyed the opportunity of being hosted on mainland Europe. In 2020, the BSP was fortunate to spend some time in Granada in Spain, where a superb meeting with excellent science in a spectacular setting was overshadowed by news of an emerging novel coronavirus. In this editorial, we hope to have captured some of that excellent science and to highlight aspects of the many great papers and reviews in this special issue, as well as provide a few images from the meeting, which we hope for this who attended will bring back some fond memories.

• MeSH
• COVID-19 * MeSH
• leishmanióza * MeSH
• lidé MeSH
• SARS-CoV-2 MeSH
• trypanozomiáza * MeSH
• Check Tag
• lidé MeSH
• Publikační typ
• časopisecké články MeSH
• komentáře MeSH
• práce podpořená grantem MeSH
• Geografické názvy
• Evropa MeSH
• Španělsko MeSH

Leishmania major is the main causative agent of cutaneous leishmaniasis in the Old World. In Leishmania parasites, the lack of transcriptional control is mostly compensated by post-transcriptional mechanisms. Methylation of arginine is a conserved post-translational modification executed by Protein Arginine Methyltransferase (PRMTs). The genome from L. major encodes five PRMT homologs, including the cytosolic protein associated with several RNA-binding proteins, LmjPRMT7. It has been previously reported that LmjPRMT7 could impact parasite infectivity. In addition, a more recent work has clearly shown the importance of LmjPRMT7 in RNA-binding capacity and protein stability of methylation targets, demonstrating the role of this enzyme as an important epigenetic regulator of mRNA metabolism. In this study, we unveil the impact of PRMT7-mediated methylation on parasite development and virulence. Our data reveals that higher levels of LmjPRMT7 can impair parasite pathogenicity, and that deletion of this enzyme rescues the pathogenic phenotype of an attenuated strain of L. major. Interestingly, lesion formation caused by LmjPRMT7 knockout parasites is associated with an exacerbated inflammatory reaction in the tissue correlated with an excessive neutrophil recruitment. Moreover, the absence of LmjPRMT7 also impairs parasite development within the sand fly vector Phlebotomus duboscqi. Finally, a transcriptome analysis shed light onto possible genes affected by depletion of this enzyme. Taken together, this study highlights how post-transcriptional regulation can affect different aspects of the parasite biology.

• MeSH
• delece genu MeSH
• Leishmania major enzymologie   genetika   metabolismus   MeSH
• leishmanióza kožní parazitologie   patologie   MeSH
• myši MeSH
• neutrofily fyziologie   MeSH
• proteinmethyltransferasy genetika   metabolismus   MeSH
• protozoální proteiny metabolismus   MeSH
• regulace genové exprese enzymů MeSH
• zvířata MeSH
• Check Tag
• myši MeSH
• zvířata MeSH
• Publikační typ
• časopisecké články MeSH
• práce podpořená grantem MeSH
• Research Support, N.I.H., Intramural MeSH