Identification of an endoplasmic reticulum-resident calcium-binding protein with multiple EF-hand motifs in asexual stages of Plasmodium falciparum

Abstract

An endoplasmic reticulum-located, calcium-binding protein, with an apparent molecular weight (M(r) of ~ 40 000 (PfERC), has been identified in the asexual stages of the malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum. This protein appears to be equivalent to a previously described gametocyte protein, Pfs40, which was reported to be expressed on the gametocyte surface (Rawlings DJ, Kaslow DC. J Biol Chem 1992;267:3976-3982). Sequencing of the 3' end of the gene revealed the omission of a single base in the 3' region of the published sequence. The corrected gene sequence encodes a C-terminal IDEL motif, which indicates residency of the 40 kDa protein within the endoplasmic reticulum. The predicted C-t..