Dr. Alina V. Goldberg

Contact information

• Phone number: +44 (0)191 222 3481
• e-mail adress: A.V.Goldberg-cavalleri (at) ncl.ac.uk

Work description

The remnant mitochondrion (mitosome) of Trachipleistophora hominis. The short arrows define the border of the microsporidian, which is living inside a rabbit kidney cell, and the stars indicate the rabbit kidney cell mitochondria. The long arrow indicates the Trachipleistophora mitosome which reacts strongly with the specific antibody to the Trachipleistophora mitochondrial Hsp70. From Embley et al. 2003.

I carried out my PhD thesis at the National Institute of Agricultural Technology (INTA) and at the Institute of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (Argentina). During that time I studied the pathology produced by the Epinotia aporema granulovirus (EpapGV) on its host Epinotia aporema, a major pest of soybean in Argentina. I also carried out the first molecular and functional study of a putative envelope-fusion protein of the Epinotia aporema granulovirus (Epap-F) involve in cell colonisation.

The main objective of my post-doctoral project, funded by a Marie Curie Fellowship, is to study the cellular evolution of microsporidia. These are microbial eukaryotes that are important obligate intracellular parasites of other eukaryotes including humans with HIV. My main focus is to determine the structure and functions of the microsporidian mitosome, a tiny remnant mitochondrion, including what it does and how it imports the proteins it needs.

Alina's publications

• Heinz E, Williams TA, Nakjang S, Noel CJ, Swan DC, Goldberg AV, Harris SR, Weinmaier T, Markert S, Becher D, Bernhardt J, Dagan T, Hacker C, Lucocq JM, Schweder T, Rattei T, Hall N, Hirt RP, Embley TM. The Genome of the Obligate Intracellular Parasite Trachipleistophora hominis: New Insights into Microsporidian Genome Dynamics and Reductive Evolution. PLoS Pathog. vol 8 p. e1002979 (2012). pubmed
• Emelyanov VV, Goldberg AV. Fermentation enzymes of Giardia lamblia, pyruvate:ferredoxin oxidoreductase and hydrogenase, do not localize to its mitosomes. Microbiology. vol 157 p. 1602-11 (2011). pubmed
• Hjort K, Goldberg AV, Tsaousis AD, Hirt RP, Embley TM. Diversity and reductive evolution of mitochondria among microbial eukaryotes. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. vol 365 p. 713-27 (2010). pubmed
• Goldberg AV, Molik S, Tsaousis AD, Neumann K, Kuhnke G, Delbac F, Vivares CP, Hirt RP, Lill R and Embley TM. Localization and functionality of microsporidian iron-sulphur cluster assembly proteins. Nature. vol 452 p. 624-8 (2008). pubmed
• Tsaousis AD, Kunji ER, Goldberg AV, Lucocq JM, Hirt RP and Embley TM. A novel route for ATP acquisition by the remnant mitochondria of Encephalitozoon cuniculi. Nature. vol 453 p. 553-6 (2008). pubmed
• Goldberg AV, Romanowski V, Federici BA and Sciocco de Cap A. Effects of the Epap granulovirus on its host, Epinotia aporema (Lepidoptera: Tortricidae). J Invertebr Pathol. vol 80 p. 148-59 (2002). pubmed
• Sciocco-Cap A, Parola AD, Goldberg AV, Ghiringhelli PD and Romanowski V. Characterization of a granulovirus isolated from Epinotia aporema Wals. (Lepidoptera: Tortricidae) larvae. Appl Environ Microbiol. vol 67 p. 3702-6 (2001). pubmed