Trypanosoma gambiense: membrane transport of amino acids

Halogenated tryptophan derivatives disrupt essential transamination mechanisms in bloodstream form Trypanosoma brucei

Amino acid metabolism within Trypanosoma brucei, the causative agent of human African trypanosomiasis, is critical for parasite survival and virulence. Of these metabolic processes, the transamination of aromatic amino acids is one of the most important. In this study, a series of halogenated tryptophan analogues were investigated for their anti-parasitic potency. Several of these analogues showed significant trypanocidal activity. Metabolomics analysis of compound-treated parasites revealed key differences occurring within aromatic amino acid metabolism, particularly within the widely reported and essential transamination processes of this parasite.

The Uptake and Metabolism of Amino Acids, and Their Unique Role in the Biology of Pathogenic Trypanosomatids

Trypanosoma brucei, as well as Trypanosoma cruzi and more than 20 species of the genus Leishmania, form a group of flagellated protists that threaten human health. These organisms are transmitted by insects that, together with mammals, are their natural hosts. This implies that during their life cycles each of them faces environments with different physical, chemical, biochemical, and biological characteristics. In this work we review how amino acids are obtained from such environments, how they are metabolized, and how they and some of their intermediate metabolites are used as a survival toolbox to cope with the different conditions in which these parasites should establish the infections in the insects and mammalian hosts.

Targeting of toxic compounds to the trypanosome's interior

Drugs can be targeted into African trypanosomes by exploiting carrier proteins at the surface of these parasites. This has been clearly demonstrated in the case of the melamine-based arsenical and the diamidine classes of drug that are already in use in the treatment of human African trypanosomiasis. These drugs can enter via an aminopurine transporter, termed P2, encoded by the TbAT1 gene. Other toxic compounds have also been designed to enter via this transporter. Some of these compounds enter almost exclusively through the P2 transporter, and hence loss of the P2 transporter leads to significant resistance to these particular compounds. It now appears, however, that some diamidines and melaminophenylarsenicals may also be taken up by other routes (of yet unknown function). These too may be exploited to target new drugs into trypanosomes. Additional purine nucleoside and nucleobase transporters have also been subverted to deliver toxic agents to trypanosomes. Glucose and amino acid transporters too have been investigated with a view to manipulating them to carry toxins into Trypanosoma brucei, and recent work has demonstrated that aquaglyceroporins may also have considerable potential for drug-targeting. Transporters, including those that carry lipids and vitamins such as folate and other pterins also deserve more attention in this regard. Some drugs, for example suramin, appear to enter via routes other than plasma-membrane-mediated transport. Receptor-mediated endocytosis has been proposed as a possible way in for suramin. Endocytosis also appears to be crucial in targeting natural trypanocides, such as trypanosome lytic factor (TLF) (apolipoprotein L1), into trypanosomes and this offers an alternative means of selectively targeting toxins to the trypanosome's interior. Other compounds may be induced to enter by increasing their capacity to diffuse over cell membranes; in this case depending exclusively on selective activity within the cell rather than selective uptake to impart selective toxicity. This review outlines studies that have aimed to exploit trypanosome nutrient uptake routes to selectively carry toxins into these parasites.

Post genomic analysis of permeases from the amino acid/auxin family in protozoan parasites

The "amino acid/auxin permeases" is probably the most represented family of transporters in the Trypanosoma cruzi genome. Using a high-throughput searching routine and preliminary data from the T. cruzi genome project, more than 15,000 sequences were iteratively assembled into contigs, and 60 open reading frames corresponding to different putative amino acid transporters, clustered in 12 groups, were detected and characterized in silico. T. cruzi genomic organization of such sequences showed that these putative amino acid transporter genes are in an unusually large number and arranged in repeat clusters comprising about 0.2% of the genome. These data suggest that the family has evolved following tandem duplication events and constitutes a novel family of variable proteins in protozoan organisms. The mRNA expression of the predicted genes was demonstrated in infective and non-infective parasite forms. Orthologous sequences were also identified in other unicellular parasites such as Leishmania spp., Plasmodium spp., and Trypanosoma brucei.

Active transport of L-proline in Trypanosoma cruzi

L-proline is the main energy source in insect vector stages of most trypanosomatids, including Trypanosoma cruzi epimastigotes. This is the first biochemical description of two active proline transporter systems in T. cruzi. Uptake of this amino acid occurred by a low affinity system B and a high affinity system A. System B consistently appeared more specific than System A when excess competing amino acids were used in transport inhibition assays. Furthermore, the high affinity system is 70% inhibited by L-tryptophan, but the low affinity system is not. Both systems were found to be insensitive to the intracellular proline concentration and D-proline did not inhibit L-proline uptake showing that both systems are stereospecific. Both systems were Na+ and K+ independant but dependant on energy since ATP depletion impairs L-proline uptake. The combined action of carbonyl cyanide p-trifluoromethoxyphenyl hydrazone (FCCP) and oligomycin, and the dependence of activity on pH, further differentiated between the two systems leading to the conclusion that the high affinity system is a H+ gradient-dependant transporter whereas the low affinity system depends directly on ATP.

Active transport of L-proline in the protozoan parasite Trypanosoma brucei brucei

The characteristics of L-proline transport in the procyclic form of Trypanosoma brucei were studied by using L-[14C]proline and a quick separation technique by centrifugation through an oil mixture. L-Proline uptake displayed typical Michaelis-Menten kinetics, with a Km of 19 microM and a maximum transport velocity of 17 nmol/min per 10(8) cells at 27 degrees C. The maximum concentration gradient factor obtained after 1 min of incubation was 270-fold in 0.02 mM proline. Cells permeabilized with 80 microM digitonin were still able to accumulate 14C label, but to a lower extent. The temperature-dependence of proline uptake gave an apparent activation energy of 74.9 kJ.mol-1. In competition studies with a 10-fold excess of structural analogues, L-alanine, L-cysteine and L-azetidine-2-carboxylate were found to inhibit L-proline uptake. Variation of pH or addition of the protonophore carbonyl cyanide m-chlorophenylhydrazone ('CCCP') did not affect proline transport, showing that it is not driven by a protonmotive force. The absence of Na+, with or without monensin, did not affect proline transport. The absence of K+ and the addition of the Na+,K(+)-ATPase inhibitor ouabain had no significant effect on proline uptake activity. The thiol-modifying reagent iodoacetate (10 mM) decreased proline uptake by half. KCN (1 mM) inhibited proline uptake to a lesser extent, and the degree of inhibition was proportional to the intracellular ATP concentration. Preliminary experiments on proline transport in plasma-membrane vesicles of the cells, using a filtration technique, showed an uptake of proline (0.67 nmol/mg of protein) by the vesicles, but only in the presence of intravesicular ATP. The results thus obtained suggest that the proline carrier system in T. brucei is ATP-driven and independent of Na+, K+ or H+ co-transport.

Threonine uptake in Trypanosoma brucei

Threonine uptake by the parasitic protozoan Trypanosoma brucei has been assessed using an oil-phase separation technique for measuring rapid amino acid fluxes. It was shown that the storage conditions for the organism were critical for the production of reproducible data. Using this method it has been shown that threonine uptake occurs rapidly, being linear for less than 30 s at 37 degrees C in contrast with previous reported results. Kinetic analysis of threonine uptake at 25 degrees C and at physiological plasma threonine levels (20-700 microM) gave a Km of 250 microM and a Vmax of 8 nmol mg-1 cell protein min-1. At these concentrations threonine uptake takes place against a concentration gradient.

The specificity of purine base and nucleoside uptake in promastigotes of Leishmania braziliensis panamensis

Promastigotes of Leishmania braziliensis panamensis absorbed the purines adenine, hypoxanthine, adenosine and inosine by a combination of diffusion and mediated components. When the uptake rates for these substrates were corrected for diffusion and compared, the purine bases adenine and hypoxanthine were transported at a significantly slower rate than the purine nucleosides adenosine and inosine. Competitive interactions among those purines tested confirmed the presence of mediated and diffusion components and suggested that three transport loci may be operating (Fig. 6). The first transport locus, designated Locus 1, transported inosine, Locus 2, the purine bases hypoxanthine and adenine and Locus 3, adenosine. In addition, adenine and hypoxanthine inhibited the uptake of one another competitively. A comparison of Ki values derived from double reciprocal plots of labelled hypoxanthine and adenine uptake in the presence of the unlabelled substrates as inhibitors suggested that adenine has a greater affinity for the transport locus.