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African origin of the malaria parasite Plasmodium vivax.

ABSTRACT: Plasmodium vivax is the leading cause of human malaria in Asia and Latin America but is absent from most of central Africa due to the near fixation of a mutation that inhibits the expression of its receptor, the Duffy antigen, on human erythrocytes. The emergence of this protective allele is not understood because P. vivax is believed to have originated in Asia. Here we show, using a non-invasive approach, that wild chimpanzees and gorillas throughout central Africa are endemically infected with parasites that are closely related to human P. vivax. Sequence analyses reveal that ape parasites lack host specificity and are much more diverse than human parasites, which form a monophyletic lineage within the ape parasite radiation. These findings indicate that human P. vivax is of African origin and likely selected for the Duffy-negative mutation. All extant human P. vivax parasites are derived from a single ancestor that escaped out of Africa.

SUBMITTER: Liu W

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4089193 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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African origin of the malaria parasite Plasmodium vivax.

Liu Weimin W Li Yingying Y Shaw Katharina S KS Learn Gerald H GH Plenderleith Lindsey J LJ Malenke Jordan A JA Sundararaman Sesh A SA Ramirez Miguel A MA Crystal Patricia A PA Smith Andrew G AG Bibollet-Ruche Frederic F Ayouba Ahidjo A Locatelli Sabrina S Esteban Amandine A Mouacha Fatima F Guichet Emilande E Butel Christelle C Ahuka-Mundeke Steve S Inogwabini Bila-Isia BI Ndjango Jean-Bosco N JB Speede Sheri S Sanz Crickette M CM Morgan David B DB Gonder Mary K MK Kranzusch Philip J PJ Walsh Peter D PD Georgiev Alexander V AV Muller Martin N MN Piel Alex K AK Stewart Fiona A FA Wilson Michael L ML Pusey Anne E AE Cui Liwang L Wang Zenglei Z Färnert Anna A Sutherland Colin J CJ Nolder Debbie D Hart John A JA Hart Terese B TB Bertolani Paco P Gillis Amethyst A LeBreton Matthew M Tafon Babila B Kiyang John J Djoko Cyrille F CF Schneider Bradley S BS Wolfe Nathan D ND Mpoudi-Ngole Eitel E Delaporte Eric E Carter Richard R Culleton Richard L RL Shaw George M GM Rayner Julian C JC Peeters Martine M Hahn Beatrice H BH Sharp Paul M PM

Nature communications 20140101

Plasmodium vivax is the leading cause of human malaria in Asia and Latin America but is absent from most of central Africa due to the near fixation of a mutation that inhibits the expression of its receptor, the Duffy antigen, on human erythrocytes. The emergence of this protective allele is not understood because P. vivax is believed to have originated in Asia. Here we show, using a non-invasive approach, that wild chimpanzees and gorillas throughout central Africa are endemically infected with ...[more]

PMID: 24557500

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Project description:BackgroundThe Americas were the last continent colonized by humans carrying malaria parasites. Plasmodium falciparum from the New World shows very little genetic diversity and greater linkage disequilibrium, compared with its African counterparts, and is clearly subdivided into local, highly divergent populations. However, limited available data have revealed extensive genetic diversity in American populations of another major human malaria parasite, P. vivax.MethodsWe used an improved sample preparation strategy and next-generation sequencing to characterize 9 high-quality P. vivax genome sequences from northwestern Brazil. These new data were compared with publicly available sequences from recently sampled clinical P. vivax isolates from Brazil (BRA, total n = 11 sequences), Peru (PER, n = 23), Colombia (COL, n = 31), and Mexico (MEX, n = 19).Principal findings/conclusionsWe found that New World populations of P. vivax are as diverse (nucleotide diversity π between 5.2 × 10-4 and 6.2 × 10-4) as P. vivax populations from Southeast Asia, where malaria transmission is substantially more intense. They display several non-synonymous nucleotide substitutions (some of them previously undescribed) in genes known or suspected to be involved in antimalarial drug resistance, such as dhfr, dhps, mdr1, mrp1, and mrp-2, but not in the chloroquine resistance transporter ortholog (crt-o) gene. Moreover, P. vivax in the Americas is much less geographically substructured than local P. falciparum populations, with relatively little between-population genome-wide differentiation (pairwise FST values ranging between 0.025 and 0.092). Finally, P. vivax populations show a rapid decline in linkage disequilibrium with increasing distance between pairs of polymorphic sites, consistent with very frequent outcrossing. We hypothesize that the high diversity of present-day P. vivax lineages in the Americas originated from successive migratory waves and subsequent admixture between parasite lineages from geographically diverse sites. Further genome-wide analyses are required to test the demographic scenario suggested by our data.

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African origin of the malaria parasite Plasmodium vivax.

Publications

African origin of the malaria parasite Plasmodium vivax.

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