Researchers sequenced 10,368 expressed sequence tags (EST) clones using a normalized cDNA library made from pooled samples of the trophont, tomont, and theront life-cycle stages, and generated 9,769 sequences (94.2% success rate). Post-sequencing processing led to 8,432 high quality sequences. Clustering analysis of these ESTs allowed identification of 4,706 unique sequences containing 976 contigs and 3,730 singletons. The ciliate protozoan Ichthyophthirius multifiliis (Ich) is an important parasite of freshwater fish that causes 'white spot disease' leading to significant losses. A genomic resource for large-scale studies of this parasite has been lacking. To study gene expression involved in Ich pathogenesis and virulence, our goal was to generate ESTs for the development of a powerful microarray platform for the analysis of global gene expression in this species. Here, we initiated a project to sequence and analyze over 10,000 ESTs.

• XLS

  Table I. Multifiliis unique EST sequences
  Download
• XLS

  Table 2. Excel spreadsheet; Summary of BLAST searches of the Ich ESTs against Tetrahymena thermophila and Plasmodium falciparum genomes
  Download
• XLS

  Table 3. Table of gene ontology (GO) profiles.
  Download
• CSV

  Data Dictionary - Supplemental Tables 1, 2, and 3
  Download