PMID- 35467660
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20220427
LR  - 20220523
IS  - 1940-087X (Electronic)
IS  - 1940-087X (Linking)
IP  - 182
DP  - 2022 Apr 6
TI  - Studying Inherited Immunity in a Caenorhabditis elegans Model of Microsporidia 
      Infection.
LID - 10.3791/63636 [doi]
AB  - Inherited immunity describes how some animals can pass on the "memory" of a 
      previous infection to their offspring. This can boost pathogen resistance in 
      their progeny and promote survival. While inherited immunity has been reported in 
      many invertebrates, the mechanisms underlying this epigenetic phenomenon are 
      largely unknown. The infection of Caenorhabditis elegans by the natural 
      microsporidian pathogen Nematocida parisii results in the worms producing 
      offspring that are robustly resistant to microsporidia. The present protocol 
      describes the study of intergenerational immunity in the simple and genetically 
      tractable N. parisii -C. elegans infection model. The current article describes 
      methods for infecting C. elegans and generating immune-primed offspring. Methods 
      are also given for assaying resistance to microsporidia infection by staining for 
      microsporidia and visualizing infection by microscopy. In particular, inherited 
      immunity prevents host cell invasion by microsporidia, and fluorescence in situ 
      hybridization (FISH) can be used to quantify invasion events. The relative amount 
      of microsporidia spores produced in the immune-primed offspring can be quantified 
      by staining the spores with a chitin-binding dye. To date, these methods have 
      shed light on the kinetics and pathogen specificity of inherited immunity, as 
      well as the molecular mechanisms underlying it. These techniques, alongside the 
      extensive tools available for C. elegans research, will enable important 
      discoveries in the field of inherited immunity.
FAU - Willis, Alexandra R
AU  - Willis AR
AD  - Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto.
FAU - Tamim El Jarkass, Hala
AU  - Tamim El Jarkass H
AD  - Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto.
FAU - Reinke, Aaron W
AU  - Reinke AW
AD  - Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto; 
      aaron.reinke@utoronto.ca.
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PT  - Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
PT  - Video-Audio Media
DEP - 20220406
PL  - United States
TA  - J Vis Exp
JT  - Journal of visualized experiments : JoVE
JID - 101313252
SB  - IM
MH  - Animals
MH  - *Caenorhabditis elegans/genetics
MH  - In Situ Hybridization, Fluorescence
MH  - *Microsporidiosis
EDAT- 2022/04/26 06:00
MHDA- 2022/04/28 06:00
CRDT- 2022/04/25 12:30
PHST- 2022/04/25 12:30 [entrez]
PHST- 2022/04/26 06:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2022/04/28 06:00 [medline]
AID - 10.3791/63636 [doi]
PST - epublish
SO  - J Vis Exp. 2022 Apr 6;(182). doi: 10.3791/63636.