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Infection and Immunity, January 2004, p. 154-158, Vol. 72, No. 1
0019-9567/04/$08.00+0 DOI: 10.1128/IAI.72.1.154-158.2004
Copyright © 2004, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Department of Immunobiology, Guy's, King's and St Thomas' School of Medicine, Guy's Hospital, London SE1 9RT,1 Department of Anatomy, Cell and Human Biology, Guy's, King's and St. Thomas' School of Biomedical Science, Guy's Hospital, London SE1 1UL, United Kingdom,3 Department of Parasitology, Biomedical Primate Research Centre, 2280 GH, Rijswijk, The Netherlands2
Received 21 July 2003/ Returned for modification 3 September 2003/ Accepted 29 September 2003
| ABSTRACT |
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| INTRODUCTION |
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The AMA-1 molecule of P. falciparum (PfAMA-1) is synthesized as an 83-kDa precursor, from which an N-terminal prodomain is cleaved (21, 27). The mature 66-kDa form of PfAMA-1 is found in micronemes, organelles of the merozoite apical complex (7, 20). It has the attributes of an integral membrane protein, with a short cytoplasmic sequence at its C terminus and three disulfide-constrained domains forming its ectodomain. Further processing results in the shedding of fragments of 44 or 48 kDa and occurs in association with the relocation of the molecule to the merozoite surface (21, 27). PkAMA-1 from Plasmodium knowlesi was the first AMA-1 family protein to be recognized (12, 14). Although this malaria parasite does not synthesize a large AMA-1 precursor, the AMA-1 molecules of the two species are essentially colinear downstream of the prosequence and the origin and fate of the PkAMA-1 molecule seem otherwise to be similar to those of PfAMA-1 (33, 39).
The candidacy of AMA-1 for inclusion in a malaria vaccine is supported by evidence drawn from studies of malaria in several animal model systems and in humans. To summarize, cognate antibody is inhibitory to parasite multiplication in vitro, while interacting with the merozoite surface (34), and also in vivo (26). AMA-1 has conferred protection in active immunization studies (11, 13, 26). Analysis of immune responses in a community in Kenya naturally exposed to P. falciparum has suggested that the recognition of T-cell epitopes in the molecule is rather labile but that the response to at least one epitope is associated with a lowered risk of disease (37).
Some of the data discussed above point to a role for AMA-1 in RBC invasion. This interpretation is supported by, first, the finding in vitro for P. knowlesi that antibodies inhibit RBC invasion by free merozoites (35) and that these antibodies do not mediate inhibition by merozoite agglutination (32). Second, it has been suggested that PfAMA-1-derived peptides inhibit merozoite interaction with RBC (38), and third, it has been suggested that there is a broadening of the range of species of target RBC which can be invaded by parasites whose AMA-1 gene has been complemented by a heterospecific AMA-1 (36). Fourth, COS-7 cells transfected with Plasmodium yoelii AMA-1 bind RBC (17), and finally, a peptide selected from a random phage display library by its high affinity for PfAMA-1 is a potent inhibitor of merozoite invasion (22). RBC invasion by malaria parasites is complex and involves several discernible stages (for reviews, see references 4 and 29). The merozoite's initial attachment to an RBC surface is random (16), is reversible, and may be mediated by major components of the complex merozoite coat-forming filamentous attachments between the two membranes at a distance of about 12 nm (9), although the receptors and ligands involved remain incompletely defined in molecular terms. This early "distant" attachment can considerably deform the host cell, giving an appearance of its wrapping around the merozoite (25) in a series of oscillations (16), but such attachment is followed by a crucial event, the reorientation of the parasite to bring its apical prominence into contact with the host cell. After apical orientation there is a tight interaction between parasite and host cell membranes, forming a junctional zone marked by a dense undercoating of the RBC membrane (23) and a closer intermembrane distance of about 4 nm (9).
Following this apical attachment, secreted material from apical organelles produces local vacuolation of the RBC membrane and the generation of an invagination, the invasion pit, beneath the region of contact (8). The merozoite now moves into the deepening invagination, apparently employing an actin-myosin motor (30) to drive the electron-dense junction as an annulus of close contact rearwards over its surface (3). The membrane of the invagination eventually seals over at the posterior of the merozoite to form the parasitophorous vacuole. For technical reasons the most complete ultrastructural descriptions of invasion obtained so far have been from P. knowlesi, the species which we have used in the present experiments. It is clearly desirable to understand the functions of candidate vaccine molecules wherever possible, and here we report evidence for the mode of action of an antibody against PkAMA-1 which inhibits invasion and which also suggests a precise biological function for AMA-1 in the invasion process.
| MATERIALS AND METHODS |
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| RESULTS |
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| DISCUSSION |
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It has recently been shown that PfAMA-1 is a micronemal component in the maturing merozoite (7, 20) and is strongly associated with the periphery of micronemes (7). The molecule has the characteristics of an integral membrane protein (21) and may therefore be inserted in the micronemal bounding membrane. No mechanism for its insertion into the merozoite plasma membrane is yet resolved, but it may flow out with the micronemal membrane directly into the merozoite plasma membrane via the apical duct(s). A concentration gradient of AMA-1 would then be expected from diffusion in the merozoite plasma membrane from apex to basal pole, and the presence of such a gradient is supported by some immuno-EM evidence (33). The present results would be consistent with a model for invasion in which the early oscillations of the merozoite and RBC seen in random attachment lead to RBC contact with a merozoite membrane region where some AMA-1 is present. Making and breaking of AMA-1-RBC bonds would then tend to rotate the merozoite "up" this concentration gradient and so establish apical reorientation. Conjecturally, it is also possible that the final processing of AMA-1 may occur in order to promote reorientation, for example by changing the affinity of AMA-1 for an RBC ligand. An analogue of this is seen in the changing affinity of processed Toxoplasma gondii MIC2 (10). Neither shed 48- and 44-kDa proteolytic fragments of PfAMA-1 (21) nor an Escherichia coli-derived and refolded recombinant PfAMA-1 complete ectodomain (15, 18) have shown RBC binding activity, but when expressed on COS cells, the full-length P. yoelii molecule bound RBC, but less well than did contiguous domains 1 and 2 (17). The affinity for RBC of AMA-1 and its processed fragments may deserve further close scrutiny in the light of the present results.
It is an alternative possibility that under normal circumstances reorientation is brought about randomly by the observed dynamic wrapping of the RBC around the merozoite, which is independent of AMA-1, and that AMA-1 is necessary for the final stabilization of the merozoite's contact when it has arrived at the correct orientation for junction formation to proceed. The existence of membranous blebs beneath some RBC surfaces, which are typical of early normal invasion, suggests that some transient apical contacts did occur in these experiments and were attended by some membranous secretion, although insufficient to initiate full invasion. Thus, AMA-1 may act together with erythrocyte binding proteins (EBPs) (2), also initially localized to the micronemes, to form part of the apical close junction itself and thus may be necessary (but not sufficient) to create the prolonged intimate contact between the RBC membrane and merozoite apex which is required to allow completion of invasion.
The formation of the junction by P. knowlesi is held to be dependent on Duffy binding proteins, members of the conserved EBP family (2). When P. knowlesi merozoites interact with Duffy blood group-negative human RBC, invasion fails as no junction is formed (23). The EBPs involved have been investigated, and functional domains have been described (see for example, reference 31). Since EBPs are also micronemal proteins (1), one must consider two further possibilities. Incubation with anti-AMA-1 antibody could inhibit invasion indirectly by impeding the extrusion of these micronemal antigens if antigen-antibody complexes were to form and plug the opening of the apical exit duct(s), or anti-AMA-1 antibody could sterically hinder a separate but essential receptor-ligand interaction. We have not rigorously excluded such effects in these experiments, but we consider these modes of action unlikely for the following reasons. First, the MAb used here is more effective on a molar basis in blocking invasion when used as an Fab fragment than as an intact antibody (34). In that monovalent form it could not cross-link antigen, so inhibition could hardly be due to duct blockage. Equally, if steric hindrance of a receptor-ligand interaction unrelated to AMA-1 were caused by antibody to AMA-1, the effect of the larger whole antibody molecule might be expected to be greater than the effect of Fab and not less as was found (34). Secondly, it is likely that P. knowlesi merozoites emerging from schizonts already have surface-distributed AMA-1, as disclosed by surface radioiodination, and that before schizont rupture this is unavailable to the MAb (14). Again, this is inconsistent with inhibition by duct blockage. Finally, cultures of rupturing P. knowlesi schizonts, free of significant numbers of contaminant normal RBC, show both the processed fragments of AMA-1 in their supernatants (14). These findings support the view that AMA-1 is already extracellular somewhat before (and independently of) the invasion event, and hence, again, that micronemal secretion of AMA-1 has occurred before the observed point of action of the MAb.
| ACKNOWLEDGMENTS |
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We are indebted to the Guy's Hospital EM unit for the provision of facilities and must acknowledge the roles of our former colleagues Sydney Cohen and Judith Deans in first posing the question answered here. G.M. and G.H.M. are grateful for valuable discussions with C. E. Chitnis, L. H. Miller, and D. S. Roos.
| FOOTNOTES |
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