Ancestral Genomes, Sex, and the Population Structure of Trypanosoma cruzi

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Abstract
Acquisition of detailed knowledge of the structure and evolution of Trypanosoma cruzi populations is essential for control of Chagas disease. We profiled 75 strains of the parasite with five nuclear microsatellite loci, 24Sα RNA genes, and sequence polymorphisms in the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit II gene. We also used sequences available in GenBank for the mitochondrial genes cytochrome B and NADH dehydrogenase subunit 1. A multidimensional scaling plot (MDS) based in microsatellite data divided the parasites into four clusters corresponding to T. cruzi I (MDS-cluster A), T. cruzi II (MDS-cluster C), a third group of T. cruzi strains (MDS-cluster B), and hybrid strains (MDS-cluster BH). The first two clusters matched respectively mitochondrial clades A and C, while the other two belonged to mitochondrial clade B. The 24Sα rDNA and microsatellite profiling data were combined into multilocus genotypes that were analyzed by the haplotype reconstruction program PHASE. We identified 141 haplotypes that were clearly distributed into three haplogroups (X, Y, and Z). All strains belonging to T. cruzi I (MDS-cluster A) were Z/Z, the T. cruzi II strains (MDS-cluster C) were Y/Y, and those belonging to MDS-cluster B (unclassified T. cruzi) had X/X haplogroup genotypes. The strains grouped in the MDS-cluster BH were X/Y, confirming their hybrid character. Based on these results we propose the following minimal scenario for T. cruzi evolution. In a distant past there were at a minimum three ancestral lineages that we may call, respectively, T. cruzi I, T. cruzi II, and T. cruzi III. At least two hybridization events involving T. cruzi II and T. cruzi III produced evolutionarily viable progeny. In both events, the mitochondrial recipient (as identified by the mitochondrial clade of the hybrid strains) was T. cruzi II and the mitochondrial donor was T. cruzi III. The parasite protozoan Trypanosoma cruzi causes Chagas disease, a malady that afflicts almost 20 million people in South America and Central America. Although the genome sequencing of T. cruzi has been recently completed, little is known about its population structure and evolution. Since 1999, two major evolutionary lineages presenting distinct epidemiological characteristics have been recognized in the parasite: T. cruzi I and T. cruzi II, the latter being much more associated with severe chronic cases of the disease. We describe new and important aspects of the population structure of the parasite, especially the characterization of a third ancestral lineage that we propose to call T. cruzi III. Through careful dissection of the genetic constitution of blocks of genes that are stably transmitted from generation to generation of the parasite we deduced at least two occurrences of the formation of hybrid strains from the parental lineages T. cruzi II and T. cruzi III, including the strain CLBrener, whose genome was sequenced. We did not find any hybrids originating from T. cruzi I. A fascinating finding was that both hybrids studied had the same mitochondrial DNA type as the T. cruzi III ancestral lineage, which was quite different from T.cruzi II.