This Week in Parasitism

Latest Episodes:

TWiP 48: A parasitic cloaking device Dec 18, 2012

Show notes

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, and Josef Sabo

Vincent, Dickson, and Josef discuss tetraspanins on the surface of schistosomes as vaccine candidates and immune evasion proteins.

Links for this episode:

S. japonicum tetraspanin-2 as a vaccine target (PLoS NTP)
Protection with S. mansoni tetraspanin-2 (PLoS NTP)
S. mansoni tetraspanins confer protection (Nat Med)
Tetraspanins
Letters read on TWiP 48

Contact

Send your questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twip@twiv.tv.

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TWiP 47: For whom the trich tolls Nov 28, 2012

Show notes

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier

Vincent and Dickson review evidence that a virus of the protozoan parasite Trichomonas vaginalis may exacerbate disease.

Links for this episode:

Endobiont viruses sensed by the human host (PLoS One)
Letters read on TWiP 47

Contact

Send your questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twip@twiv.tv

TWiP 46: Malaria gets the (zinc) finger Oct 17, 2012

Show notes

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier

Vincent and Dickson meet with Judith Straimer and Marcus Lee to discuss their method for site-specific genome editing in Plasmodium falciparumusing zinc finger nucleases.

Right-click to download TWiP #46 (46 MB .mp3, 64 minutes).

Links for this episode:

Judith Straimer and Marcus Lee
Genome editing in P. falciparum with zinc finger nucleases (Nature Methods)
Zinc finger nucleases (Sigma-Aldrich)
Gene-editing nucleases (Nature Methods)
Illustration by Andrew Lee

Contact

Send your questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twip@twiv.tv.

TWiP 45: Free range Toxoplasma with John Boothroyd Sep 26, 2012

Show notes

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier

Vincent and Dickson discuss Toxoplasma biology with Stanford University Professor John Boothroyd.

Links for this episode:

T. gondii and free range animals
Kiss and spit: Toxoplasma rhoptries (Nat Rev Micro)
Toxoplasma cell invasion (Curr Opin Micro)
Loading of IRG onto parasitophorous vacuole (Cell Micro)
Toxoplasma gondii on TWiP #12

Contact

Send your questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twip@twiv.tv.

Subscribe (free)

Subscribe to TWiP (free) in iTunes, at the Zune Marketplace, by the RSS feed or by email

TWiP 44: Parasites provide a cricket subsidy for trout Sep 07, 2012

Show notes

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier

Vincent and Dickson explain how a nematode manipulates cricket behavior and alters the food web of a stream.

Links for this episode:

Nematomorph parasites alter food web of streams (Ecol Lett)
Manipulation of cockle behavior by a trematode (Parasitology)
Cockles infected by one parasite are more susceptible to a second (J Parasitol)
Letters read on TWiP 44

Contact

Send your questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twip@twiv.tv.

TWiP 43: Two remarkable host-parasite conflicts Aug 23, 2012

Show notes

Vincent and Dickson review how sickle cell microRNAs contribute to malaria resistance, and inhibition of innate immune responses by an enzyme from trypanosomes.

Links for this episode: