mp23, a Theileria parva transmembrane protein with homology to the protein disulfide isomerase family

The protozoan parasite Theileria parva (Apicomplexa) causes the bovine disease East Coast Fever in endemic areas in Subsaharan Africa. The intralymphocytic schizont stage is largely responsible for the pathogenicity and induces a transformed phenotype in host cells [1]. Current evidence supports a model in which the schizont perturbs the immune response by inducing production of cytokines and stimulating the growth of parasitized cells [2]. We were interested to identify parasite proteins involved in parasite/host interaction and have described earlier a screening procedure for identification of schizont stage-exported proteins based on cell-free expression of cDNA and testing for transloca…