Visceral Leishmaniasis (VL) is an insect-borne neglected disease caused by the protozoan parasite Leishmania donovani. In the absence of a commercial vaccine against VL, chemotherapy is currently the only option used for the treatment of VL. Vaccination has been considered as the most effective and powerful tool for complete eradication and control of infectious diseases. In this study, we aimed to design a peptide-based vaccine against L. donovani using immunobioinformatic tools. We identified 6 HTL, 18 CTL, and 25 B-cell epitopes from three hypothetical membrane proteins of L. donovani. All these epitopes were used to make a vaccine construct along with linkers. An adjuvant was also added at the N-terminal to enhance its immunogenicity. After that, we checked the quality of this vaccine construct and found that it is nontoxic, nonallergic, and thermally stable. A 3D structure of the vaccine construct was also generated by homology modeling to evaluate its interaction with innate immune receptors (TLR). Molecular docking was performed, which confirmed its binding with a toll-like receptor-2 (TLR-2). The stability of vaccine-TLR-2 complex and underlying interactions were evaluated using molecular dynamic simulation. Lastly, we carried out in silico cloning to check the expression of the final designed vaccine. The designed vaccine construct needs further experimental and clinical investigations to develop it as a safe and effective vaccine against VL infection.
Fascioliasis, a neglected foodborne disease caused by liver flukes
(genus Fasciola), affects more than 200 million people
worldwide. Despite technological advances, little is known about the
molecular biology and biochemistry of these flukes. We present the
draft genome of Fasciola gigantica for
the first time. The assembled draft genome has a size of ∼1.04
Gb with an N50 and N90 of 129 and 149 kb, respectively. A total of
20 858 genes were predicted. The de novo repeats
identified in the draft genome were 46.85%. The pathway included all
of the genes of glycolysis, Krebs cycle, and fatty acid metabolism
but lacked the key genes of the fatty acid biosynthesis pathway. This
indicates that the fatty acid required for survival of the fluke may
be acquired from the host bile. It may be hypothesized that the relatively
larger F. gigantica genome did not
evolve through genome duplications but rather is interspersed with
many repetitive elements. The genomic information will provide a comprehensive
resource to facilitate the development of novel interventions for
fascioliasis control.
Granular cell tumors are rare soft tissue neoplasms, among which only 2% are malignant, arising from nervous tissue. Here we present a case of a large esophageal granular cell tumor with benign histopathological features which metastasized to the liver, but showing on positron emission tomography-computerized tomography standardized uptake value suggestive of a benign lesion.
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