Prospects of Using High-Throughput Proteomics to Underpin the Discovery of Animal Host-Nematode Interactions.

Tao Wang,Robin B Gasser

doi:10.3390/pathogens10070825

Abstract

Parasitic nematodes impose a significant public health burden, and cause major economic losses to agriculture worldwide. Due to the widespread of anthelmintic resistance and lack of effective vaccines for most nematode species, there is an urgent need to discover novel therapeutic and vaccine targets, informed through an understanding of host–parasite interactions. Proteomics, underpinned by genomics, enables the global characterisation proteins expressed in a particular cell type, tissue and organism, and provides a key to insights at the host–parasite interface using advanced high-throughput mass spectrometry-based proteomic technologies. Here, we (i) review current mass-spectrometry-based proteomic methods, with an emphasis on a high-throughput ‘bottom-up’ approach; (ii) summarise recent progress in the proteomics of parasitic nematodes of animals, with a focus on molecules inferred to be involved in host–parasite interactions; and (iii) discuss future research directions that could enhance our knowledge and understanding of the molecular interplay between nematodes and host animals, in order to work toward new, improved methods for the treatment, diagnosis and control of nematodiases.

Highlights

Diseases caused by parasitic nematodes do impose a significant public health burden, and cause major economic losses to agriculture in the subtropical and tropical countries [1]
In the present article, (i) we review mass spectrometry (MS)-based proteomic approaches available to explore parasitic worms, with an emphasis on the high-throughput ‘bottom-up’ approach; (ii) we appraise recent advances that have been made in the study of the proteomes of parasitic nematodes of animals, highlighting proteins inferred to be involved in host– parasite interactions, and (iii) we provide a perspective on areas of future work that should assist in gaining an enhanced understanding of the molecular interplay of nematodes with their hosts
Proteomic studies of ES, Extracellular Vesicles (EVs) and somatic proteins of parasitic nematodes can underpin molecular investigations of host–parasite interactions to enable the identification of intervention targets and diagnostic markers or biomarkers

Summary

Introduction

Diseases caused by parasitic nematodes do impose a significant public health burden, and cause major economic losses to agriculture in the subtropical and tropical countries [1]. Mass spectrometry (MS)-based proteomics represents an integral postgenomic technology that can be used to characterise all proteins expressed in a particular cell type, tissue and/or organism under a defined set of conditions The use of such technology allows biological insights via protein identification, quantification, localisation and the definition of post-translational modifications, as well as the elucidation of protein dynamics and functions at the host–parasite interface linked to host invasion, parasite survival, host immune evasion and immunoregulation [15,16]. The ‘bottom-up’ approach is based on the analysis of small peptides obtained following extensive proteolytic digestion, and allows the large-scale characterisation of complex mixtures of molecules derived from whole worms, organ systems, tissues or cells. We have elected to include studies published in the last five years, because this is when most progress has been made using high-throughput proteomics due the availability of informative nuclear genomic data sets for selected socioeconomically important parasitic nematodes of animals

Recent High-Throughput Proteomic Explorations of Parasitic Nematodes

The Secretome

The Somatic Proteome

Findings

Conclusions and Opportunities for Future Research