Costume Change

Imagine a master criminal who changes disguise every time you think you’ve got her, forever confusing your pursuit. That's the trick some parasites play on our immune system. Investigating the intestinal parasite Giardia lamblia, researchers observed what happens when our immune system’s antibodies lock onto the unique protein markers (green) on the parasite surface. Rather than killing the invader, this binding prompted the surface markers to clump together and detach from the parasite in enclosed bubbles. In their place, the parasite grew new identifiers (red) that the antibodies might not yet know how to recognise. This clearance of the tell-tale signs leaves the immune system playing catchup as it tries to recognise the new appearance. Understanding this switcheroo changes how we view host-parasite interactions, and could be important for any new treatments that aim to boost the immune system’s capacity to fend off parasitic problems.

Written by Anthony Lewis

Anthony Lewis

Writer

Ant was the web editor in the early days of BPoD, and has since worked with the UK’s top science organisations as a writer and multimedia producer. He now splits his time between freelance work and managing multimedia at The Lancet.

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• Image from work by Albano H. Tenaglia, Lucas A. Luján, Diego N. Ríos and Cecilia R. Molina, and colleagues
• Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo en Inmunología y Enfermedades Infecciosas (CIDIE), Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET)/Universidad Católica de Córdoba (UCC), X5016HDK, Córdoba, Argentina
• Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• Published in Nature Communications, May 2023