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A parental transcriptional response to microsporidia infection induces inherited immunity in offspring

Alexandra R. Willis, Winnie Zhao, Ronesh Sukhdeo, Lina Wadi, Hala Tamim El Jarkass, Julie M. Claycomb, View ORCID ProfileAaron W. Reinke
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.10.11.335117
Alexandra R. Willis
1Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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Winnie Zhao
1Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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Ronesh Sukhdeo
1Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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Lina Wadi
1Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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Hala Tamim El Jarkass
1Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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Julie M. Claycomb
1Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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Aaron W. Reinke
1Department of Molecular Genetics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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  • ORCID record for Aaron W. Reinke
  • For correspondence: aaron.reinke@utoronto.ca
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Abstract

Inherited immunity is an emerging field and describes how the transfer of immunity from parents to offspring can promote progeny survival in the face of infection. The mechanisms of how inherited immunity is induced are mostly unknown. The intracellular parasite Nematocida parisii is a natural microsporidian pathogen of Caenorhabditis elegan s. Here, we show that N. parisii-infected worms produce primed offspring that are resistant to microsporidia infection. We find that immunity is induced in a dose dependent manner and lasts for a single generation. Intergenerational immunity prevents host cell invasion by N. parisii and also enhances survival to the bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Further, we show that inherited immunity is triggered by the host transcriptional response to infection, which can also be induced through maternal somatic depletion of negative regulators PALS-22 and the retinoblastoma protein ortholog LIN-35. We show that other biotic and abiotic stresses, such as viral infection and cadmium exposure, that induce a similar transcriptional response to microsporidia can also induce immunity in progeny. Our results demonstrate that distinct stimuli can induce inherited immunity to provide resistance against multiple classes of pathogens. These results show that activation of an innate immune response can provide protection against pathogens not only within a generation, but also in the next generation.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Copyright 
The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC 4.0 International license.
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Posted October 11, 2020.
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A parental transcriptional response to microsporidia infection induces inherited immunity in offspring
Alexandra R. Willis, Winnie Zhao, Ronesh Sukhdeo, Lina Wadi, Hala Tamim El Jarkass, Julie M. Claycomb, Aaron W. Reinke
bioRxiv 2020.10.11.335117; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.10.11.335117
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A parental transcriptional response to microsporidia infection induces inherited immunity in offspring
Alexandra R. Willis, Winnie Zhao, Ronesh Sukhdeo, Lina Wadi, Hala Tamim El Jarkass, Julie M. Claycomb, Aaron W. Reinke
bioRxiv 2020.10.11.335117; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.10.11.335117

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