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Updated: Jul 20, 2025

Detection of Trypanosoma brucei Variant Surface Glycoprotein Switching by Magnetic Activated Cell Sorting and Flow Cytometry
Published on: October 19, 2016
Decoding the impact of nuclear organization on antigenic variation in parasites
Anna Barcons-Simon1,2, Mark Carrington3, T Nicolai Siegel4,5
1Division of Experimental Parasitology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany.
Abstract:
Antigenic variation as a strategy to evade the host adaptive immune response has evolved in divergent pathogens. Antigenic variation involves restricted, and often mutually exclusive, expression of dominant antigens and a periodic switch in antigen expression during infection. In eukaryotes, nuclear compartmentalization, including three-dimensional folding of the genome and physical separation of proteins in compartments or condensates, regulates mutually exclusive gene expression and chromosomal translocations. In this Review, we discuss the impact of nuclear organization on antigenic variation in the protozoan pathogens Trypanosoma brucei and Plasmodium falciparum. In particular, we highlight the relevance of nuclear organization in both mutually exclusive antigen expression and genome stability, which underlie antigenic variation.
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