{"doi":"10.1038/s41598-024-72628-0","title":"Toxoplasma FER1 is a versatile and dynamic mediator of differential microneme trafficking and microneme exocytosis","abstract":"Toxoplasma gondii is a polarized cell concentrating several secretory organelles at the apical pole. The secretory micronemes come in two sub-populations differentiated by dependence on Rab5A/C in their biogenesis. Calcium-dependent exocytosis of micronemes occurs at the very apical tip and is critical for parasite egress from its host cell, adhesion and invasion of the next cell. Ferlins represent a protein family with roles in exocytosis containing multiple Ca2+-sensing C2 domains. We determined that T. gondii’s ferlin 1 (FER1) localized dynamically to the parasite’s secretory pathway. FER1 function was dissected by dominant negative overexpression strategies. We demonstrated that FER1 traffics microneme organelles along the following trajectories: (1) Along the cortex to the apical end; (2) To the apical tip for fusion with the plasma membrane; (3) Differential microneme sub-population traffic, and that FER1 could putatively be responsible for microneme protein trafficking. (4) From the trans-Golgi-endosomal network to the subpellicular cortex; (5) Retrograde transport allowing microneme recycling from mother to daughter. Finally, FER1 overexpression triggers a microneme exocytosis burst, supporting the notion that the radially organized micronemes at the apical tip comprise a readily-releasable microneme pool. In summary, FER1 is pivotal for dynamic microneme trafficking, acts differently on the two microneme subpopulations, and acts on the plasma membrane fusion step during microneme exocytosis.","journal":"Scientific Reports","year":2024,"id":443275,"datarank":0.37705020437501013,"base_score":2.1972245773362196,"endowment":2.1972245773362196,"self_citation_contribution":0.32958368660043297,"citation_network_contribution":0.04746651777457716,"self_endowment_contribution":0.32958368660043297,"citer_contribution":0.04746651777457716,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":8,"citer_count":6,"citers_with_citation_signal":4,"citers_with_endowment":4,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9558,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2024-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":559946,"name":"Adeline Ribeiro E Silva","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":559238,"name":"Allison A. Drozda","orcid":"0000-0003-2643-2269","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":353145,"name":"Isabelle Coppens","orcid":"0000-0001-5549-2362","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":559239,"name":"Bradley I. Coleman","orcid":"0000-0003-4217-508X","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":559240,"name":"Marc‐Jan Gubbels","orcid":"0000-0002-2769-8600","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":559237,"name":"Daniel N. A. Tagoe","orcid":"0000-0001-6268-7838","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":81,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:01:24.471942Z","pmid":"39294204","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}