The Schistosoma mansoni transcriptome: an update

Abstract

Large scale EST sequencing projects have been carried out for Schistosoma mansoni and Schistosoma japonicum. This update will briefly review the most recent accomplishments in the area and discuss the use of EST data for the purposes of gene discovery, gene model development, genome annotation and SNP analysis. In addition, the use of ESTs for studying other features of the transcriptome such as splice site and transcription initiation variants will be discussed as well as approaches to assigning function to unknown transcripts. Although EST sequencing has contributed much for schistosome research, other data mining possibilities exist, including the identification of putative drug and vaccine targets.

Figure 1

Methods for producing expressed sequence tags (ESTs). The complete cDNA clone is represented by the central line. A – ORESTES. B – Conventional cDNA sequencing. Conventional cDNAs are usually 100 to 500 bp sequences produced from cDNA cloned and sequenced directionally in respect to the 5' or 3' end, and tend to accumulate at the end of the representing mRNA. On the other hand, ORESTES are shorter sequences that tend to accumulate on the central region of the representing mRNA.