Toxoplasma spreads through the body by riding inside infected immune cells, which it turns hypermotile. We previously showed that this depends on the secreted effector TgWIP. In mBio we now show that TgWIP binds the host adaptor proteins Nck1 and Grb2 through two proline-rich regions, and the WAVE regulatory complex through a WIRS motif.
Mutating these interaction sites blunts podosome dissolution and dendritic cell hypermotility, revealing how a single parasite protein engages several actin regulators at once to move its host cell.
Read the paper: Toxoplasma effector TgWIP hijacks dendritic cell actin and motility via Nck1/Grb2 and the WAVE complex. mBio 2025.