Abstract
We describe simple and sensitive in vitro and in vivo assays to analyze Plasmodium liver stage development using transgenic P. berghei parasites (PbGFP-Luccon), which express the bioluminescent reporter protein, luciferase. In these assays, parasite development in hepatocytes is visualized and quantified by real-time bioluminescence imaging both in culture and in live mice. We also describe quantification of in vitro liver-stage development by measuring luminescence using a microplate reader. Reporter-parasite based quantification of liver-stage development is faster and correlates very well with established quantitative RT-PCR methods currently used to assess parasite development inside hepatocytes, both in live mice and in culture.
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Acknowledgment
TA, SC, and SMK received financial support of Top Institute Pharma (The Netherlands) project: T4-102.
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Annoura, T., Chevalley, S., Janse, C.J., Franke-Fayard, B., Khan, S.M. (2012). Quantitative Analysis of Plasmodium berghei Liver Stages by Bioluminescence Imaging. In: Ménard, R. (eds) Malaria. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 923. Humana Press, Totowa, NJ. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-62703-026-7_30
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-62703-026-7_30
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Publisher Name: Humana Press, Totowa, NJ
Print ISBN: 978-1-62703-025-0
Online ISBN: 978-1-62703-026-7
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