A parental transcriptional response to microsporidia infection induces inherited immunity in offspring | New Voices in Infection Biology

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Talk abstract:

The transfer of immunity from parents to offspring is important for promoting survival of progeny. The mechanisms of how this immunity is induced in the parent are mostly unknown. Using Nematocida parisii, a natural microsporidian pathogen of Caenorhabditis elegans, we show that N. parisii-infected worms produce primed offspring that are resistant to microsporidia infection. Immunity prevents host cell invasion by N. parisii and also enhances survival to the bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Further, we show that intergenerational immunity is triggered by the host transcriptional response to infection, which can also be induced through maternal somatic depletion of negative regulators PALS-22 and the retinoblastoma protein ortholog, LIN-35. Other stresses, such as viral infection and cadmium, that induce a similar transcriptional response, also induce immunity in progeny. Our results demonstrate that distinct stimuli can induce intergenerational immunity to provide resistance against multiple classes of pathogens. These results show that activation of an innate immune response against a pathogen is used not only to provide protection within a generation, but to the next generation.