Projects & Grants




Functional genomics of Leishmania virulence
Project Id17-10656S
Main solverprof. MSc. Vjačeslav Jurčenko, Ph.D.
Period1/2017 - 12/2019
ProviderKatedra biologie a ekologie, Standardní projekt GA ČR
Statefinished
AnotationLeismaniasis is a serious emerging neglected vector-borne parasitic disease affecting millions people worldwide. Absence of vaccination, expensive treatment and emergence of resistance stress the need for new strategies to control the disease. The present knoeledge on virulent factors affecting the parasite development in hosts (inc. humans) and vectors (sand flies) is limited, do not correlate with enormous efforts and many crucial virulent/avirulent lines, parasite differentiation stages and several leishmania/Leptomonas species we have preselected promising targets. These putative virulent factors will be characterized by molecular and biochemical aprroaches and tested in vitro/vivo models to evaluate their involving to parasite virulence/pathogenicity. Involved proteins are very attractive targets for anti- Leishmania drug development and intervention and we suggest that inhibiting expression of these genes may result in reduced virulence and pathogenicity of Leishmania infection.