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Open AccessResearch article

Investigating hookworm genomes by comparative analysis of two Ancylostoma species

Makedonka Mitreva* 1 email, James P McCarter* 1,2 email, Prema Arasu3 email, John Hawdon4 email, John Martin1 email, Mike Dante1 email, Todd Wylie1 email, Jian Xu1 email, Jason E Stajich5 email, Wadim Kapulkin6,7 email, Sandra W Clifton1 email, Robert H Waterston1,8 email and Richard K Wilson1 email

1Genome Sequencing Center, Department of Genetics, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63108, USA

2Divergence Inc., St. Louis, MO 63141, USA

3College of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Molecular Biomedical Sciences, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27606, USA

4Department of Microbiology and Tropical Medicine, George Washington University Medical Center, Washington, DC 20037, USA

5Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA

6Department of Infectious Diseases, Microbiology and Parasitology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Warsaw Agricultural University, Warszawa, Poland

7School of Biology, University of Leeds, LEEDS LS2 9JT, UK

8Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA

author email corresponding author email* Contributed equally

BMC Genomics 2005, 6:58doi:10.1186/1471-2164-6-58

Published: 26 April 2005

Abstract

Background

Hookworms, infecting over one billion people, are the mostly closely related major human parasites to the model nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Applying genomics techniques to these species, we analyzed 3,840 and 3,149 genes from Ancylostoma caninum and A. ceylanicum.

Results

Transcripts originated from libraries representing infective L3 larva, stimulated L3, arrested L3, and adults. Most genes are represented in single stages including abundant transcripts like hsp-20 in infective L3 and vit-3 in adults. Over 80% of the genes have homologs in C. elegans, and nearly 30% of these were with observable RNA interference phenotypes. Homologies were identified to nematode-specific and clade V specific gene families. To study the evolution of hookworm genes, 574 A. caninum / A. ceylanicum orthologs were identified, all of which were found to be under purifying selection with distribution ratios of nonsynonymous to synonymous amino acid substitutions similar to that reported for C. elegans / C. briggsae orthologs. The phylogenetic distance between A. caninum and A. ceylanicum is almost identical to that for C. elegans / C. briggsae.

Conclusion

The genes discovered should substantially accelerate research toward better understanding of the parasites' basic biology as well as new therapies including vaccines and novel anthelmintics.


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