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In Vitro Infections of Macrophage-Like Cell Lines with Leishmania infantum for Drug Screening

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Leishmania

Part of the book series: Methods in Molecular Biology ((MIMB,volume 1971))

Abstract

The study of in vitro infections is essential to evaluate distinct aspects of Leishmania biology and also invaluable for more meaningful in vitro screening of promising chemical entities. Macrophage-like cells lines from different origins are amenable to Leishmania infection. Cell lines due to their stability and standardization potential are highly valued for their capacity to support reproducible infections and consistent data. In fact, these cells have been a mainstay of leishmaniasis research for more than 40 years. In this context, the human monocytic THP-1 cell line is commonly used as it can be differentiated with phorbol-12myristate-13-acetate (PMA) into macrophages that are susceptible to Leishmania infection. In this section, we will describe generalities concerning the use of cell lines for in vitro Leishmania infection using THP-1 derived macrophages and Leishmania infantum axenic amastigotes expressing luciferase associated to preclinical drug screening as example.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by funds from the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT)/Ministério da Educação e Ciência (MEC) cofunded by the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) under the Partnership agreement PT2020, through the Research Unit No.4293. This work also received funds from project POCI-01-0145-FEDER-031013 financed by Portugal 2020, under the Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização (COMPETE 2020) and Norte-01-0145-FEDER-000012—Structured program on bioengineered therapies for infectious diseases and tissue regeneration, supported by Norte Portugal Regional Operational Programme (NORTE 2020), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the FEDER. J.T. is an Investigator FCT funded by National funds through FCT and cofunded through European Social Fund within the Human Potential Operating Programme.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. i3S-Instituto de Investigação e Inovação em Saúde, Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Nuno Santarém, Joana Tavares & Anabela Cordeiro-da-Silva

  2. IBMC–Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular, Parasite Disease Group, Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Nuno Santarém, Joana Tavares & Anabela Cordeiro-da-Silva

  3. Departamento de Ciências Biológicas, Faculdade de Farmácia, Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Anabela Cordeiro-da-Silva

Authors
  1. Nuno Santarém
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  2. Joana Tavares
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  3. Anabela Cordeiro-da-Silva
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Anabela Cordeiro-da-Silva .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Hamburg, Germany

    Joachim Clos

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Santarém, N., Tavares, J., Cordeiro-da-Silva, A. (2019). In Vitro Infections of Macrophage-Like Cell Lines with Leishmania infantum for Drug Screening. In: Clos, J. (eds) Leishmania. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 1971. Humana Press, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-9210-2_14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-9210-2_14

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  • Publisher Name: Humana Press, New York, NY

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4939-9209-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4939-9210-2

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