Figure 1

Schematic domain architecture and genomic organization of putative CIR proteins. For a representative CIR protein of cir subfmily 1 and 2 the protein domain architecture is shown in the upper and exon/intron structure in the lower panel. The protein and gene sequences are presented by lines, protein domains and exons are indicated by boxes. Separate scale bars are given for protein and gene structure, respectively. The CIR-BIR-YIR Superfamily (pink, accession number [PF06022] for the Pfam database) includes CIR, BIR and YIR proteins of the Plasmodium species P. chabaudi, P. berghei and P. yoelii exhibiting a conserved domain of a consensus sequence of 279 amino acids which is encoded by the first and second exon of the conserved three exon structure of these pir genes [22, 23]. The COOH-terminal transmembrane domain (TM), shown as green box. is still part of the CIR-BIR-YIR domain. Exons are indicated by blue boxes.