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Copyright of Revista Biomedica is the property of Centro de Investigaciones Regionales Dr. Hideyo Noguchi; Facultad de Medicina, UADY and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Leishmania mexicana is an intracellular parasite that causes cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) in some countries, including Mexico. Recently, we identified the elongation factor-1α (EF-1α) of L. mexicana by immunoproteomic analysis. In Leishmania donovani, this molecule has been reported as a virulence factor involved in downregulation of macrophages by no-canonical function when EF-1α interacts with protein tyrosine phosphatase-1 (SHP-1). However, in L. mexicana the key role of EF-1α in host-parasite relationship has not been elucidated, by this reason we started with cloning and recombinant expression of this antigen. A sequence of 1350 bp corresponding to EF-1α (EF-Lm) full-length gene was amplified from genomic DNA of L. mexicana (GenBank: MG256973); this gene contains only one nucleotide change: C464T, compared with L. mexicana reference sequence (GenBank: FR799570.1). The gene cloned (EF-Lm) codes for a protein of 449 residues. It was expressed in Escherichia coli and purified as 63 kDa sumo-fusion protein, which was recognized in the sera of patients diagnosed with CL. Our results show that EF-Lm is immunogenic during infection, and the rEF-Lm could be used for further analyses in the host-parasite relationship.

Previously, we identified five Leishmania mexicana antigens reacting with antibodies from cutaneous leishmaniasis patients, designated on the basis of their molecular weights as p26 (pI 7.8), p27 (pI 8.1), p28 (pI 8.6), p29 (pI 8.5), and p31 (pI 9.0). Among these antigens, p29 was most strongly recognized by the antibodies. Thereafter, p29 was identified as elongation factor-1α (EF-1α) of Leishmania mexicana through mass spectrometry analysis and western blot using a commercial antibody that reacted with EF-1α from different species. Our results showed that the p29 antigen of Leishmania mexicana is EF-1α.