Philippe BASTIN

Information

Scientific interests and projects

The Trypanosome Cell Biology Unit fits perfectly with the 4 major scientific topics highlighted by the ParaFrap consortium:

• Post-genomic data exploration: The unit is studying the function of various genes in trypanosomes, especially at the level of the cytoskeleton, using a collection of tools such as inducible RNAi, double knockout, gene replacement or Cas9/Cas13 approaches. This is done at the level of parasites in culture but also during infection in tsetse flies or in mice.

• Mechanisms of pathogenesis: Thanks to its own tsetse fly breeding colony, the unit can ask questions through the full life cycle of African trypanosomes and importantly it can study the infection via the natural route that is the bite of the tsetse fly.

• Parasite molecular and cellular biology: The unit is well known for cell biology, especially in the context of cell movement, protein trafficking and organelle function, once again in in vitro and in vivo contexts.

• Towards new intervention strategies against parasitic pathogens: The work carried out in the field in collaboration with the IRD and partners in Africa has significant potential for the diagnosis of gambiense HAT and could change the way both patient treatment and follow-up is carried out. It could be very significant for the WHO programme of elimination of the disease

Top 5 publications of the last 5 years

1. Bertiaux, E., Morga, B., Blisnick, T., Rotureau, B., and Bastin, P. (2018). A Grow-and-Lock Model for the Control of Flagellum Length in Trypanosomes. Curr Biol 28, 3802-3814 e3803. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2018.10.031

2. Bonnefoy, S., Watson, C.M., Kernohan, K.D., Lemos, M., Hutchinson, S., Poulter, J.A., Crinnion, L.A., Berry, I., Simmonds, J., Vasudevan, P., O'Callaghan, C., Hirst, R.A., Rutman, A., Huang, L., Hartley, T., Grynspan, D., Moya, E., Li, C., Carr, I.M., Bonthron, D.T., Leroux, M., Care4Rare Canada, C., Boycott, K.M., Bastin, P., and Sheridan, E.G. (2018). . Am J Hum Genet 103, 727-739. doi: 10.1016/j.ajhg.2018.10.003

3. Bertiaux, E., Mallet, A., Fort, C., Blisnick, T., Bonnefoy, S., Jung, J., Lemos, M., Marco, S., Vaughan, S., Trepout, S., Tinevez, J.Y., and Bastin, P. (2018). Bidirectional intraflagellar transport is restricted to two sets of microtubule doublets in the trypanosome flagellum. J Cell Biol 217, 4284-4297. doi: 10.1083/jcb.201805030

4. Calvo-Alvarez, E., Cren-Travaille, C., Crouzols, A., and Rotureau, B. (2018). A new chimeric triple reporter fusion protein as a tool for in vitro and in vivo multimodal imaging to monitor the development of African trypanosomes and Leishmania parasites. Infect Genet Evol 63, 391-403. doi: 10.1016/j.meegid.2018.01.011

5. Capewell, P., Cren-Travaille, C., Marchesi, F., Johnston, P., Clucas, C., Benson, R.A., Gorman, T.A., Calvo-Alvarez, E., Crouzols, A., Jouvion, G., Jamonneau, V., Weir, W., Stevenson, M.L., O'Neill, K., Cooper, A., Swar, N.K., Bucheton, B., Ngoyi, D.M., Garside, P., Rotureau, B., and MacLeod, A. (2016). The skin is a significant but overlooked anatomical reservoir for vector-borne African trypanosomes. Elife 5:e17716. doi: 10.7554/eLife.17716