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Updated: Aug 13, 2026
Sexual Transmission of American Trypanosomes from Males and Females to Naive Mates
Published on: January 27, 2019
Polymorphic and differential expression of the Trypanosoma cruzi alleles containing universal minicircle binding
Elielton R Coelho1, Deivid de Carvalho Rodrigues, Turán P Urményi
1Instituto de Biofísica Carlos Chagas Filho, CCS, Bloco G, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro 21949-900, Brazil.
Abstract:
DNA replication mechanisms are poorly understood in most of trypanosomatids, in particular the replication of the peculiar mitochondrial DNA, the kinetoplast DNA (kDNA). To contribute to the knowledge on the mechanism of kDNA replication in Trypanosoma cruzi, we have previously characterized the Universal Minicircle Sequence Binding Protein of this parasite (TcUMSBP), which was first called PDZ5 [E.R. Coelho, T.P. Urmenyi, J. Franco da Silveira, E. Rondinelli, R. Silva, Identification of PDZ5, a candidate universal minicircle sequence binding protein of Trypanosoma cruzi, Int. J. Parasitol. 33 (2003) 853-858]. In this work, we describe two highly polymorphic alleles of the TcUMSBP locus in the T. cruzi reference clone CL Brener and the differential expression pattern of these alleles. A 62 bp sequence in the TcUMSBP upstream intergenic region in one of its alleles affects the efficiency of polycistronic RNA processing and the polyadenylation sites, and therefore regulates the differential expression of TcUMSBP alleles of this locus.
