Transcriptome Profiling of Aetiological Agents of Cattle Theileriosis

The tick transmitted protozoan parasite, Theileria parva, infects animals of the family Bovidae, particularly buffalo and cattle. Although buffalo are asymptomatic, T. parva infections cause two different but equally severe diseases, East Coast fever (ECF) and Corridor disease (CD) in cattle. Aetiological agents of ECF, cattle-derived T. parva, and the most fatal CD, buffalo-derived T. parva, are morphological and serological undistinguishable yet they cause different disease syndromes. In an effort to understand factors influencing the resulting disease, transcriptomes of two T. parva isolates, T. parva Muguga (cattle-derived) and T. parva 7014 (buffalo-derived) were analyzed using the Illumina RNA-Seq technique.

A total of 3969 mapped reads were detected, 3925 from T. parva Muguga and 3916 from T. parva 7014. From the mapped reads, 3788 transcripts were shared between the two isolates isolates while n=53 transcripts were exclusively detected from T. parva Muguga and n=44 from T. parva 7014. A total of 717, 788 and 738 transcripts were identified as significantly differentially expressed in the analysis of MGA/7014A, MGA/7014B and MGB/7014A, respectively. However, only 461 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified as common between the three datasets, 64.6% of which were annotated in the NCBI non-redundant protein database. Among the common DEGs, 151 were assigned to gene ontology categories; using the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway database, 89 DEGs were sorted into 137 pathways. This comprehensive transcriptomic analysis provides fundamental information on the genes and pathways involved in T. parva infections.