%0 Journal Article
%T A comparison of the Giardia lamblia trophozoite and cyst transcriptome using microarrays
%A Zahra Faghiri
%A Giovanni Widmer
%J BMC Microbiology
%D 2011
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/1471-2180-11-91
%X To investigate the magnitude of the transcriptional changes occurring during the G. lamblia life cycle we compared the transcriptome of G. lamblia trophozoites and cysts using single-color oligonucleotide microarrays. Cysts were found to possess a much smaller transcriptome, both in terms of mRNA diversity and abundance. Genes encoding proteins related to ribosomal functions are highly over-represented. The comparison of the transcriptome of cysts generated in culture or extracted from feces revealed little overlap, raising the possibility of significant biological differences between the two types of cysts.The comparison of the G. lamblia cyst and trophozoite transcriptome showed that transcripts of most genes are present at a lower level in cysts. This global view of the cyst and trophozoite transcriptome complements studies focused on the expression of selected genes during trophozoite multiplication, encystation and excystation.Giardia lamblia (G. duodenalis, G. intestinalis) is a diplomonad parasite which causes over 20,000 reported cases of giardiasis a year in the United States [1]. In addition to its importance as a widespread human and animal pathogen, the long evolutionary history of the diplomonad lineage makes G. lamblia an interesting system for studying eukaryotic evolution and the evolution of parasitism. Research on G. lamblia is aided by the fact that the entire life cycle can be studied outside the host, and that the differentiation from cyst to trophozoite and the reverse process of encystation can be reproduced in vitro. Recently, the availability of the complete genome sequence [2-5] have facilitated genome-wide analyses.Although many Giardia proteins and organelles have been studied in detail, genome-wide studies of the transcriptome and proteome have been few [6-11]. No microarray analyses of the transcriptome of cysts obtained from infected animals have to our knowledge been performed. Serial Analysis of Gene Expression (SAGE) was used to sur
%U http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2180/11/91