Malaria parasites use a soluble RhopH complex for erythrocyte invasion and an integral form for nutrient uptake

• DOI: 10.7554/elife.65282
• Publication Date: 2021-01-04T13:00:23Z
• Authors: Marc A Schureck; Joseph E Darling; Alan Merk; Jinfeng Shao; Geervani Daggupati; Prakash Srinivasan; Paul Dominic B Ol...; Michael P Rout; Brian T Chait; Kurt Wollenberg; Sriram Subramaniam; Sanjay A Desai
• Keywords: Plasmodium (life cycle); Transport protein; Structural Biology

Malaria parasites use the RhopH complex for erythrocyte invasion and channel-mediated nutrient uptake. As member proteins are unique to Plasmodium spp., how they interact traffic through subcellular sites serve these essential functions is unknown. We show that synthesized as a soluble of CLAG3, RhopH2, RhopH3 with 1:1:1 stoichiometry. After transfer new host cell, crosses vacuolar membrane surrounding intracellular parasite becomes integral PTEX translocon-dependent process. present 2.9 Å single-particle cryo-electron microscopy structure trafficking complex, revealing CLAG3 interacts other subunits over large surface areas. This tightly assembled extensive disulfide bonding predicted transmembrane helices shielded. propose protein stabilized but poised insertion large-scale rearrangements, paralleling smaller two-state pore-forming in organisms.