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Infection and Immunity, October 2006, p. 5814-5819, Vol. 74, No. 10
0019-9567/06/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/IAI.01690-05
Copyright © 2006, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Genetics and Bioinformatics Division, The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, 1G Royal Pde, Parkville, Victoria 3050, Australia,1 Department of Medical Biology, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria 3010, Australia,2 Menzies Research Institute, 17 Liverpool St., Hobart, Tasmania 7000, Australia3
Received 13 October 2005/ Returned for modification 24 January 2006/ Accepted 3 July 2006
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In humans, genetic polymorphisms have been identified that influence the onset, severity, and outcome of malaria infection (2, 7). The vast majority of these genes are involved in erythroid and immune processes. Erythrocyte polymorphisms, such as sickle-cell anemia, glucose-6-phosphate-dehydrogenase deficiency, and band 3 ovalocytosis, have been postulated to inhibit parasite growth, reduce parasite invasion, and promote parasite clearance (1, 14, 16). Among the variants that affect the immune response are HLA class I and class II haplotypes (11) and levels of the inflammatory cytokine tumor necrosis factor
(12). In addition, linkage analyses have detected chromosomal regions that affect the course of disease (8, 15). These studies show that the genetic components contributing to host resistance are complex and affect multiple genes. In human studies, population heterogeneity, parasite polymorphisms, and environmental heterogeneity compound the difficulties involved with identifying host genetic polymorphisms that protect against disease. It is easier to dissect a complex trait, like malaria resistance, in experimental mouse models.
Inbred strains of mice differ in susceptibility to the murine malaria agent Plasmodium chabaudi (17). Resistance in strains such as C57BL/6 is associated with survival, reduced blood-stage parasitemia at the height of infection, and a vigorous inflammatory immune response. Susceptible strains include C3H/He, SJL, and A/J. Using linkage analyses of backcross and intercross mice from C57BL/6, C3H/He, SJL, and A/J lines, several quantitative trait loci (QTL) that confer resistance to P. chabaudi malaria have been identified (2, 4-6, 9, 10). A locus that regulated peak parasitemia and survival to infection was mapped to chromosome 8 (char2) (4, 5). Recently, the char2 locus was confirmed in a partial genome scan in an F11 advanced intercross line (AIL) derived from A/J and C57BL/6 parents (9). Interestingly, the traits used in the Foote et al. (4) and Fortin et al. (5) studies, peak parasitemia and survival, were not employed in this AIL analysis. Instead, linkage was found to the first principal component score, PR1, which reflected the overall average level of parasitemia for days 2 to 7 postinfection. This suggested that char2 acted earlier in infection than suggested by the previous QTL analyses.
Progeny testing of a panel of chromosome 8 congenic mice, generated from C57BL/6 and C3H/He lines, showed that char2 could independently influence the outcome of P. chabaudi adami DS infection (3). The C57BL/6.C3H/He(7)-char2 (Char2-7) congenic strain, with a C57BL/6 background genome and a C3H/He interval spanning most of chromosome 8, was significantly more susceptible to infection than C57BL/6 controls. Compared to the C57BL/6 parental mice, Char2-7 mice had an earlier peak of infection, significantly higher peak parasitemia levels, and higher mortality rates. In contrast, lines with smaller congenic intervals towards the proximal and central sections of the chromosome survived infection, were resistant to malaria, and did not replicate the Char2-7 susceptibility phenotype. This suggested that there were either several genes of small effect contributing to the char2 QTL or that there was a major resistance gene at the distal end of chromosome 8 (D8Mit166-D8Mit156) in a region that did not exhibit linkage in the original genome scan. Interestingly, Hernandez-Valladares et al. (9) performed analyses for multiple QTLs in the AIL population but failed to find linked loci on chromosome 8. This, however, does not invalidate the hypothesis that there are multiple genes on chromosome 8 influencing the outcome of P. chabaudi infection. The mapping study may only have detected a subset of these genes. Unless the parental lines carried functionally different alleles, linked loci would not have been detected in the linkage analyses. Furthermore, since each QTL analysis only uncovered linkages to a subset of resistance traits, there could be loci that were missed.
In order to refine the map position of the char2 locus and determine if there were multiple P. chabaudi resistance genes on chromosome 8, we derived a series of recombinant lines from the Char2-7 congenic strain. Progeny testing confirmed that there were two or more genes at the char2 locus influencing the resistance trait. Two regions that were most likely to harbor these loci were identified and are targets for the generation of further recombinant congenic strains.
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P. chabaudi infection. An isolate of P. chabaudi adami DS was used in the infections and passaged through female C57BL/6 mice. Experimental mice were infected intravenously with 1 x 104 or 2.5 x 104 parasitized red blood cells (pRBCs). All mice were monitored for 20 days postinfection, and parasitemia levels were determined from Giemsa-stained thin blood smears as described previously (2).
Statistical analysis. Log-rank analyses were used to test for differences between Kaplan-Meier cumulative survival curves for congenic and parental strains. Differences in parasite burdens over the course of infection between mouse strains were compared with a permutation test (http://bioinf.wehi.edu.au/software). Values of P < 0.05 were considered significant. Data are presented as the means ± standard errors of the means (SEM).
Normalization of mortality data and modeling. In order to correct for the effect of changing parasite lethality, a method of normalizing the data using C57BL/6 and C3H/He as controls was developed. Since C57BL/6 is highly resistant to malaria, its mortality rate should be very low. Conversely, C3H/He is highly susceptible, and its mortality rate should be close to 100%. For each strain (i) in a batch (j), the mortality rate, pij, was adjusted (pij*) using pij* = (pij pC57BL/6,j)/(pC3H/He,j pC57BL/6,j). In the few cases where the proportion of congenics dying was lower than the proportion for C57BL/6 in that batch, the congenics rate was set to zero. Only female mice were included in the analysis.
A statistical model was developed to try to predict the location of the susceptibility locus or loci. The model for two loci is described here, but it generalizes to any number in a straightforward manner. We assume initially that the loci for malaria susceptibility are at marker positions m1 and m2. In each congenic strain, the marker alleles come from either C57BL/6 or C3H/He. If both alleles are from C57BL/6, then the proportion of mice dying, qi, will be low. If both are from C3H/He, then the proportion will be high. If one marker is from C3H/He and the other is from C57BL/6, then the proportion will be intermediate (in this case, there are two ways to select an allele from each strain, and these may be treated the same or independently). The likelihood of the data under the model is log L(data | m1, m2)
, where summation is performed over all strains. The susceptibility loci, m1 and m2, may be found by calculating the likelihood for all possible loci pairs and selecting those that yield the maximum likelihood. This model has four parameters; however, this is reduced to three if we make the approximation that q(C57BL/6, C3H/He) = q(C3H/He, C57BL/6). The parameter values may either be assumed or estimated by maximum likelihood.
The model was first applied to the normalized mortality data, with fixed values for the model mortality rates, q(m1, m2), exploring a range of values. These parameters were also estimated using maximum likelihood. Simulations (results not shown) suggest that using fixed values is more robust to any inconsistencies remaining in the mortality data after normalization while still yielding the correct predicted loci.
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FIG. 1. Genotype of the original panel of char2 congenic strains at a selection of microsatellite markers on chromosome 8. These lines have C57BL/6 background genomes and C3H/He congenic intervals. Map positions (in centimorgans [cM]) were obtained from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology database (http://www.broad.mit.edu/resources.html).
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FIG. 2. Genotype of the recombinant strains derived from the Char2-7 congenic line at a selection of microsatellite markers on chromosome 8. Map positions (in centimorgans [cM]) were obtained from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology database.
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FIG. 3. Mortality rates for Char2-7 recombinant congenic and C57BL/6 parental mice following infection with P. chabaudi pRBCs. Data are means ± SEM.
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FIG. 4. Course and outcome of infection in Char2-7, Char2-8, and Char2-11 congenic mice and C57BL/6 controls. A. Mortality rates in the years 2000 to 2001 and 2003 to 2004. B. Kaplan-Meier cumulative survival curve from a 2003 to 2004 challenge. C. Average blood-stage parasitemia over the course of infection from a 2003 to 2004 challenge. Data are presented as means ± SEM.
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Normalization and modeling. The raw and normalized mortality rates are shown in Fig. 5. Generally, the effect of normalization is quite small; however, the mortality rates of the Char2-7f, Char2-7p, and Char2-7q congenic mice are substantially reduced.
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FIG. 5. Effect of normalization on mortality rates for each congenic strain. Standard deviations are also shown.
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TABLE 1. Loci giving the maximum likelihood of the mortality data under a single-locus model for assumed mortality rates fall into four classes for the parameters exploreda
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TABLE 2. Loci giving the maximum likelihood of the mortality data under a two-locus, three-parameter modela
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Because of the uncertainties introduced by the changes in parasite lethality, we adopt the approach of integrating the results across a spectrum of reasonable parameter choices. Two critical regions that had the highest likelihood of harboring the char2 resistance loci were identified at D8Mit27-D8Mit266 and D8Mit14-D8Mit56. A third region, D8Mit86-D8Mit166, also emerged for some model parameter values.
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Susceptibility was associated with blood-stage parasitemia, with high peak parasitemia levels correlated with mortality. There appeared to be a threshold parasitemia level, beyond which death was the usual outcome. Although genetic determinants had a major influence on whether mice reached this parasitemia threshold, the high level of intrastrain variation between experiments suggested that minor changes in environmental or parasite factors could alter the outcome of infection.
The high level of phenotypic variation between experiments and the significant increase in susceptibility of the Char2-11 and Char2-8 congenic lines over time complicated efforts to finely map the char2 QTL. A statistical approach was necessary to adjust for the observed variation. Through data normalization and statistical modeling, two critical regions at the distal end (between D8Mit14 and D8Mit56) and central section (between D8Mit27 and D8Mit266) of chromosome 8, which were most likely to harbor malaria resistance loci, were identified. These have become target intervals for the generation of an additional series of recombinant congenic lines. These loci must interact to give a strong susceptibility phenotype; however, as a result of the variability encountered in the experiments, it is not clear if they have epistatic or additive effects. Interestingly, the original genome scan in a (C3H/He x C57BL/6)F2 population failed to detect multiple-resistance loci on chromosome 8. More than half the markers on chromosome 8, however, were significantly linked to resistance, so there was a possibility that several linked loci contributed to the char2 QTL. One of the limitations of the Mapmaker/QTL package (4) is that it only identifies loci that act independently. R/QTL, which can detect interacting loci, was used in a retrospective analysis of the linkage data but failed to detect additional loci and replicated the Mapmaker results (Russell Thomson, personal communication).
The individual effect of each of the char2 genes appears to be small, and given the variability of the survival phenotype, a massive effort will be required to progeny test recombinants for further fine-scale mapping. Based on mortality rates, the subtle susceptibility phenotypes were approaching the limits of differentiation. Blood-stage parasitemia was associated with resistance and was less vulnerable to experimental variability.
Conventional mapping strategies using congenic mouse strains confirmed that the char2 locus, detected in QTL mapping crosses, influenced the outcome of P. chabaudi infection. Fine-structure mapping, however, showed that multiple loci of small effect must combine to have an obvious effect on malaria resistance at the char2 QTL. This appears to be a common occurrence in mapping studies. Recently, a number of studies have found that loci identified in linkage analyses for traits such as susceptibility to obesity and epilepsy consist of several loci of small effect (13, 18). Given that polymorphisms in a large number of genes could potentially influence survival and the host response to malaria infection, the char2 results are not surprising. Epidemiological, linkage, association, and gene-targeting studies have already implicated a vast array of genes, involved in erythroid and immune processes, in malaria protection (2, 7). Genetic dissection of the underlying char2 genes will be challenging. Despite the difficulties in phenotyping subtle changes in susceptibility, the generation of further recombinant lines will be an important step towards the positional cloning of these genes. These congenic strains are also powerful tools for functional analyses, which will help identify candidate genes and pathways involved in malaria resistance.
Supplemental material for this article may be found at http://iai.asm.org/. ![]()
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