Browsing by Subject "Pneumocystis"

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    8-aminoquinolines effective against Pneumocystis carinii in vitro and in vivo
    (American Society for Microbiology, 1999-10) Queener, Sherry F.; Bartlett, Marilyn S.; Nasr, Mohamed; Smith, James W.; Pharmacology and Toxicology, School of Medicine
    The activities of 25 8-aminoquinolines were compared in tests assessing the ability of the compounds to inhibit the growth of Pneumocystis carinii in culture. Six compounds were effective at or below 0.03 microM: CDRI 80/53, NSC19894, NSC305805, NSC305812, WR182234, and primaquine. Four others were effective at between 0.2 and 0.03 microM: NSC305835, WR225448, WR238605, and WR242511. Fourteen drugs were also tested in a standard model of P. carinii pneumonia in rats at daily doses of 2 mg/kg of body weight in drinking water. CDRI 80/53, NSC305805, NSC305835, and WR225448 were extremely effective in the animal model. The effectiveness of WR238605, WR242511, and primaquine in the rat model has been reported elsewhere (M. S. Bartlett, S. F. Queener, R. R. Tidwell, W. K. Milhouse, J. D. Berman, W. Y. Ellis, and J. W. Smith, Antimicrob. Agents Chemother. 35:277-282, 1991). The length of the alkyl chain separating the nitrogens in the substituent at position 8 of the quinoline ring was a strong determinant of anti-P. carinii activity.
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    Diversity and Complexity of the Large Surface Protein Family in the Compacted Genomes of Multiple Pneumocystis Species
    (American Society for Microbiology, 2020-03-03) Ma, Liang; Chen, Zehua; Huang, Da Wei; Cissé, Ousmane H.; Rothenburger, Jamie L.; Latinne, Alice; Bishop, Lisa; Blair, Robert; Brenchley, Jason M.; Chabé, Magali; Deng, Xilong; Hirsch, Vanessa; Keesler, Rebekah; Kutty, Geetha; Liu, Yueqin; Margolis, Daniel; Morand, Serge; Pahar, Bapi; Peng, Li; Van Rompay, Koen K.A.; Song, Xiaohong; Song, Jun; Sukura, Antti; Thapar, Sabrina; Wang, Honghui; Weissenbacher-Lang, Christiane; Xu, Jie; Lee, Chao-Hung; Jardine, Claire; Lempicki, Richard A.; Cushion, Melanie T.; Cuomo, Christina A.; Kovacs, Joseph A.; Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, School of Medicine
    Pneumocystis, a major opportunistic pathogen in patients with a broad range of immunodeficiencies, contains abundant surface proteins encoded by a multicopy gene family, termed the major surface glycoprotein (Msg) gene superfamily. This superfamily has been identified in all Pneumocystis species characterized to date, highlighting its important role in Pneumocystis biology. In this report, through a comprehensive and in-depth characterization of 459 msg genes from 7 Pneumocystis species, we demonstrate, for the first time, the phylogeny and evolution of conserved domains in Msg proteins and provide a detailed description of the classification, unique characteristics, and phylogenetic relatedness of five Msg families. We further describe, for the first time, the relative expression levels of individual msg families in two rodent Pneumocystis species, the substantial variability of the msg repertoires in P. carinii from laboratory and wild rats, and the distinct features of the expression site for the classic msg genes in Pneumocystis from 8 mammalian host species. Our analysis suggests multiple functions for this superfamily rather than just conferring antigenic variation to allow immune evasion as previously believed. This study provides a rich source of information that lays the foundation for the continued experimental exploration of the functions of the Msg superfamily in Pneumocystis biology.
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    Species Name Change for Pneumocystis
    (American Society for Cytotechnology, 2005-03) Frain, Barbara