Comparative proteomic analysis of surface proteins of Trichinella spiralis muscle larvae and intestinal infective larvae.

The critical step for Trichinella spiralis infection is that muscle larvae (ML) are activated to intestinal infective larvae (IIL) and invade intestinal epithelium to further develop. The IIL is its first invasive stage, surface proteins are directly exposed to host environment and are crucial for larval invasion and development. In this study, shotgun LC-MS/MS was used to analyze surface protein profiles of ML and IIL. Totally, 41 proteins common to both larvae, and 85 ML biased and 113 IIL biased proteins. Some proteins (e.g., putative scavenger receptor cysteine-rich domain protein and putative onchocystatin) were involved in host-parasite interactions. Gene ontology analysis revealed that proteins involved in generation of precursor metabolites and energy; and nucleobase, nucleoside, nucleotide and nucleic acid metabolic process were enriched in IIL at level 4. Some IIL biased proteins might play important role in larval invasion and development. qPCR results confirmed the high expression of some genes in IIL. Our study provides new insights into larval invasion, host-Trichinella interaction and for screening vaccine candidate antigens.