Comparative Transcriptomic Analysis of the Larval and Adult Stages of Taenia pisiformis

Taenia pisiformis is a tapeworm causing economic losses in the rabbit breeding industry worldwide. Due to the absence of genomic data, our knowledge on the developmental process of T. pisiformis is still inadequate. In this study, to better characterize differential and specific genes and pathways associated with the parasite developments, a comparative transcriptomic analysis of the larval stage (TpM) and the adult stage (TpA) of T. pisiformis was performed by Illumina RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) technology and de novo analysis. In total, 68,588 unigenes were assembled with an average length of 789 nucleotides (nt) and N50 of 1485 nt. Further, we identified 4093 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in TpA versus TpM, of which 3186 DEGs were upregulated and 907 were downregulated. Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes (KEGG) analyses revealed that most DEGs involved in metabolic processes and Wnt signaling pathway were much more active in the TpA stage. Quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) validated that the expression levels of the selected 10 DEGs were consistent with those in RNA-seq, indicating that the transcriptomic data are reliable. The present study provides comparative transcriptomic data concerning two developmental stages of T. pisiformis, which will be of great value for future functional studies on the regulatory mechanisms behind adult worm pathogenesis and for developing drugs and vaccines against this important parasite.