Profound effect of asparagine-linked glycosylation protein 11 (TgALG11) on genomic expression of Toxoplasma gondii

Toxoplasma gondii is an intracellular parasite that relies on complex molecular mechanisms to support its proliferation and survival. In this study, we investigate the role of TgALG11 in these processes and explore the underlying regulatory network. Our data demonstrate that TgALG11 is essential for maintaining T. gondii proliferation and for normal N-glycosylation. To further elucidate the molecular mechanisms underlying the essential functions of TgALG11, we performed transcriptome sequencing to identify the genes regulated by this factor. Total RNA was extracted from iTgALG11 strains cultured with 0.5 µg/ml ATc (knockdown strain) and DMSO (control), and subjected to deep sequencing using the Illumina Novaseq™ 6000 platform. The sequence reads were subsequently mapped to the T. gondii genome, resulting in a comprehensive transcriptome encompassing 8,948 genes. Among these, 934 genes were differentially expressed due to TgALG11 deficiency, including 315 downregulated and 5 upregulated genes (DESeq, |log2(FoldChange)| = 1, padj = 0.05). Functional enrichment analysis revealed that these genes were associated with various Gene Ontology (GO) terms and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathways. Our findings provide novel insights into the profound impact of TgALG11 on the T. gondii transcriptome, underscoring its critical role in parasite biology. Overall design: Three replicates of iTgALG11 transgenic parasites cultured with 0.5 µg/ml ATc (knockdown strain) and DMSO (control) were prepared and sent to Novo gene (Beijing, China) for TgALG11-specific transcriptome construction and analysis. .