Articles - Trypanosoma
13 important questions on Articles - Trypanosoma
How is the bloodstream form protected against complement mediated lysis?
Where does the bloodstream form trypanosome express VSG?
Where does the metacyclic trypanosome express VSG? And when are they active?
They are active immediately after infection, but are quickly silenced when the parasite switches to exclusive activation of one of the bloodstream form VSG expression sites
- Higher grades + faster learning
- Never study anything twice
- 100% sure, 100% understanding
At which locations can you find VSG genes? And how many?
2. Telomeric VSGs (minichromosomes), 150-250
3. VSGs in bloodstream form VSG expression sites, 20
What are the switch mechanisms and how do they work?
2. Telomere exchange, the telomeres switch
3. In situ switch, active expression site is silenced while a silent one is activated
Which switch mechanism is the most important and why?
Which VSG genes are activated early in an infection?
How do you get mosaic VSG?
How did VSG pseudogenes accumulate?
2. Telomere: they are located on telomeres where there is little homology so less repair
3. Generation: when generating new VSG genes, many non-functional VSG genes are generated
How can the large amount of VSG genes be advantageous?
2. Pseudogenes cause the different VSG genes to have different activation frequencies, so you get more diversity in a population of trypanosoma
How can the diversity of VSG genes be maintained?
2. Transcriptional switch: you only switch the site where the genes are being expressed, however, selection pressure
3. Telomere exchange: this can occur on the minichromosomes where there are nog VSG genes and which is an important place to store VSG genes. There is little selection pressiure
How can you have multiple expression sites but only 1 is being expressed?
2. Most silent VSG genes are inverted so you dont read them in the same direction
3. Boundary elements are in between housekeeping genes and VSG genes, they stop expression
Why are many genes located on telomeres?
The question on the page originate from the summary of the following study material:
- A unique study and practice tool
- Never study anything twice again
- Get the grades you hope for
- 100% sure, 100% understanding