The life-threatening disease alveolar echinococcosis is caused by larvae of the tapeworms Echinococcus multilocularis. As intermediate host, humans are infected by oral uptake of oncosphere larvae, followed by asexual multiplication and severe growth of the metacestode within host organs. Recent advances revealed that host–parasite interaction mechanisms that occur early during an infection, when the invading oncosphere stage undergoes a metamorphosis towards the metacestode, is critical role of parasite stem cells during this process. Furthermore, recent cell biological investigations have demonstrated that E. multilocularis employs pluripotent stem cells, called germinative cells, which are the only parasite cells capable of proliferation and which give rise to all differentiated cells. Germinative cells are also crucial for parasite recurrence upon discontinuation of treatment. The role of epigenetic features, such as chromatin structure, in the parasite germinative cells, parasite growth and development have been intensively investigated in the recent years. Here, eight validated histone marks will be used to characterize key cell types by chromatin immunoprecipitation assays with sequencing (ChIP-Seq) which is a powerful method for identifying genome-wide DNA binding sites for transcription factors and other proteins. Providing a powerful characterization of the chromatin structures of key cell types, we aim elucidate the functional role for histone methylation/acetylation during E. multilocularis development. In addition, by combining chromatin structure and transcriptomic data, we aim to elucidate the role of each histone mark in the gene expression of E. multilocularis. This data is part of a pre-publication release. For information on the proper use of pre-publication data shared by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (including details of any publication moratoria), please see http://www.sanger.ac.uk/datasharing/
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