Figure 5.

Overexpression of ezrin and radixin but not moesin increases EAs invasion rates. HeLa cells overexpressing ERM wild type and mutants were incubated with EAs for 2 h (MOI 10:1), fixed and mounted in coverslips for quantification under fluorescence microscopy. (A–C) EAs invasion rates in HeLa cells overexpressing ezrin, radixin or moesin wild type, inactive C-terminal residue (alanine residue) or constitutively active (acidic residue) compared to GFP transfected cells (GFP). For radixin (HA tagged), cells were submitted to immunofluorescence protocol. (D) Graph shows that GFP tag and transfection does not interfere in EA invasion rates compared to non-transfected cells (-). The experiment was performed in duplicate (two coverslips per group in each experiment) and intracellular parasites were counted in 50 cells/coverslip. This result is the mean and standard deviation of four independent experiments ±SD. ^*P < 0.05, ^**P < 0.005, and ^***P < 0.0001.