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Updated: Jun 6, 2026

Chemical Cartography Approaches to Study Trypanosomatid Infection
Published on: January 21, 2022
Phylogenetic character mapping of proteomic diversity shows high correlation with subspecific phylogenetic diversity
Jenny Telleria1, David G Biron, Jean-Paul Brizard
1Unité Mixte de Recherche, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement/Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Génétique et Evolution des Maladies Infectieuses, n° 2724, Centre Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, 34394 Montpellier Cedex 5, France.
Abstract:
We performed a phylogenetic character mapping on 26 stocks of Trypanosoma cruzi, the parasite responsible for Chagas disease, and 2 stocks of the sister taxon T. cruzi marinkellei to test for possible associations between T. cruzi-subspecific phylogenetic diversity and levels of protein expression, as examined by proteomic analysis and mass spectrometry. We observed a high level of correlation (P < 10(-4)) between genetic distance, as established by multilocus enzyme electrophoresis, and proteomic dissimilarities estimated by proteomic Euclidian distances. Several proteins were found to be specifically associated to T. cruzi phylogenetic subdivisions (discrete typing units). This study explores the previously uncharacterized links between infraspecific phylogenetic diversity and gene expression in a human pathogen. It opens the way to searching for new vaccine and drug targets and for identification of specific biomarkers at the subspecific level of pathogens.
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