Jessica Kissinger

Research

How do eukaryotic and organellar genome sequences evolve? Our lab is interested in parasite genomics and the biology of genome evolution. The nuclear and organellar genome sequences of parasitic eukaryotes are often highly-reduced, devoid of recognizable mobile elements and riddled with intracellular and lateral gene transfers. Our approach is to apply molecular, computational and phylogenetic tools to the analysis of complete parasite genome sequences. Projects include the development of tools for data integration, data mining, comparative genomics and the systems biology of host-pathogen interactions. Kissinger is a member of the NIH/NIAID Bioinformatic Resource Center, VEuPathDB.org leadership team. Research focuses on the apicomplexan protist pathogens, Toxoplasma gondii and several species of Cryptosporidium and Plasmodium. Researchers in our group work at the bench, the computer, or both.

Of Note

University Professor, UGA, 2025
Lamar Dodd Creative Research Award, UGA, 2024
Fulbright US Scholar, Fulbright Scholar Program, 2022
Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science, 2021
Fellow, American Society for Tropical Medicine & Hygiene, 2020
Distinguished Research Professor, UGA, 2017
Richard F. Reiff Internationalization Award, UGA, 2016
SEC Academic Leadership Development Program Fellow, 2015-2016
Faculty Excellence in Diversity Award, UGA, 2013
Creative Research Medal, UGA, 2009
Kavli Fellow, Frontiers of Science 2005-2006, 2008

Grant Support

NIH R21AI180871 “Gene regulation in Cryptosporidium” Role: PI (2024-2026)
NIH 75N93019R00028, “Center for Influenza Disease and Emergence Research (CIDER)” (2021-2028) Role: Co-I
NIH R01AI148667, “Capturing the genomic variation present in Cryptosporidium and cryptosporidiosis” (2020-2026) Role: Joint-PI with Travis Glenn
Fund for Advancement of Science and Medicine “Sustainable FAIR access to Omic-Scale Datasets for Eukaryotic Pathogens” (2024-2025), Role: Co-I

Selected Publications

(*= Graduate student; # = Undergraduate student)

*Rui Xiao, Rodrigo P. Baptista, *Fiifi Agyabeng-Dadzie, *Yiran Li, Yinxin Dong, Robert J. Schmitz, Travis C. Glenn, and Jessica C. Kissinger. Deciphering Transcription in Cryptosporidium parvum: Polycistronic Gene Expression and Chromatin Accessibility. 2025. bioRxiv. Pre-print doi:10.1101/2025.01.17.633476 (Submitted)
Randi Turner, Doaa Naguib, Elora Pierce, Alison Li, Matthew Valente, Travis Glenn, Benjamin M. Rosenthal, Jessica C Kissinger, Asis Khan.Amplicon sequencing detects, identifies, and quantifies minority variants in mixed-species infections of Cryptosporidium parasites. 2025. mBio 9 September 2025. https://doi.org/10.1128/mbio.01109-25.
Bayona-Vásquez NJ,Sullivan AH, Beaudry MS, Khan A, Baptista RP, Petersen K, Bhuiyan MIU, Brian Brunelle, Robinson G, Chalmers RM, Grigg ME, Kissinger JC, Glenn TC. Whole genome targeted enrichment and sequencing in Cryptosporidium SPP. 2025. bioRxiv. Pre-print doi:10.1101/2024.03.29.586458 (In Revision).
*Rui Xiao, Rodrigo de Paula Baptista,*Yiran Li, Travis C. Glenn and Jessica C. Kissinger. New T2T assembly of Cryptosporidium parvum IOWA annotated with reference genome gene identifiers 2025. Scientific Data Jun 19;12(1):1039. doi: 10.1038/s41597-025-05364-3.
*Fiifi Dadzie, Megan Beaudry, Alex Deyanov, Haley Slani, Mihn Q. Duong, Randi Turner, Asis Khan, Cesar Arias, Jessica C. Kissinger, Travis Glenn, Rodrigo de Paula Baptista. Evaluating the Benefits and Limits of Multiple Displacement Amplification in Whole-Genome Oxford Nanopore Sequencing. Mol Ecol Resour. 2025 Feb 28:e14094. doi: 10.1111/1755-0998.14094
*Lasya R Penumarthi, Rodrigo Baptista, Megan S Beaudry, Travis C Glenn and Jessica C Kissinger. A new chromosome-level genome assembly and annotation of Cryptosporidium meleagridis 2024. Sci Data. Dec 18;11(1):1388. doi: 10.1038/s41597-024-04235-7.
Sriveny Dangoudoubiyam, Jamie Norris, *Sivaranjani namasivayam, Rodrigo de Paula Baptista, Naila Cannes do Nascimento, Joseph Camp, Christopher L. Schardl, Jessica C. Kissinger and Daniel K. Howe. Temporal gene expression during asexual development of the apicomplexan Sarcocystis neurona. 2024. mSphere doi:10.1128/msphere.00111-24
Wes Van Voorhis, Joyce Siwila, Jessica Kissinger, Natalia Bayona Vásquez, Guy Robinson, Rodrigo Baptista, Asis Khan, Amandine Guérin, Yi-Wei Chang, Zannatun Noor,Bishara Marzook, Sumiti Vinayak^,Sam Arnold,Chelsea Marie, Robert Choy,Mattie C. Pawlowic,Rajiv S. Jumani. The first Cryptosporidium meeting: a concerted effort to fight cryptosporidiosis. 2024. Trends in Parasitology. May 02, 2024. doi:10.1016/j.pt.2024.04.005
*Fiifi Agyabeng-Dadzie, *Rui Xiao and Jessica C. Kissinger. Cryptosporidium Genomics – Current Understanding, Advances, and Applications. Solicited Review. (2024) Current Tropical Medicine Reports doi: 10.1007/s40475-024-00318-y
Evelina Y. Basenko, Achchuthan Shanmugasundram, Ulrike Böhme, David Starns, Paul Wilkinson, Helen R. Davison, Kathryn Crouch, Gareth Maslen, Omar Harb, Beatrice Amos, Mary Ann McDowell, Jessica C. Kissinger, David S. Roos, Andrew Jones. What’s new in FungiDB, a web-based bioinformatics platform for omics scale data analysis for fungal and oomycete species. (2024) Genetics. Mar 26:iyae035. doi: 10.1093/genetics/iyae035
Nigel Yarlett, Mary Morada, Deborah A. Schaefer, Kevin Ackman, Elizabeth Carranza, Rodrigo de Paula Baptista, Michael W. Riggs and Jessica C. Kissinger. Genomic and virulence analysis of in vitro cultured Cryptosporidium parvum. (2024) PLoS Pathog 20(2):e1011992. doi: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1011992
Jorge Alvarez-Jarreta, Beatrice Amos, Cristina Aurrecoechea, Saikou Bah, Matthieu Barba, Ana Barreto, Evelina Y Basenko, Robert Belnap, Ann Blevins, Ulrike Böhme, John Brestelli, Stuart Brown, Danielle Callan, Lahcen I. Campbell, George K. Christophides, Kathryn Crouch, Helen R. Davison, Jeremy DeBarry, Richard Demko, Ryan Doherty, Yikun Duan, Walter Dundore, Sarah Dyer, Dave Falke, Steve Fisher, Bindu Gajria, Daniel Galdi, Gloria I. Giraldo-Calderón, Omar S. Harb, Elizabeth Harper, Danica Helb, Connor Howington, Sufen Hu, Jay Humphrey, John Iodice, Andrew Jones, John Judkins, Sarah A. Kelly, Jessica C. Kissinger, Nupur Kittur, Dae Kun Kwon, Kristopher Lamoureux, Wei Li, Disha Lodha, Robert M. MacCallum, Gareth Maslen, Mary Ann McDowell8, Jeremy Myers, Mustafa Veysi Nural, David S. Roos, Samuel S.C. Rund, Achchuthan Shanmugasundram, Vasily Sitnik, Drew Spruill, David Starns, Sheena Shah Tomko, Haiming Wang, Susanne Warrenfeltz, Robert Wieck, Paul A. Wilkinson, Jie Zheng. (2024) VEuPathDB: the eukaryotic pathogen, vector and host bioinformatics resource center. Nucleic Acids Research, doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkad1003
Sebastian Shaw, Ian S. Cohn, Rodrigo P. Baptista, Guoqin Xia, Bruno Melillo, *Fiifi Agyabeng-Dadzie, Jessica C. Kissinger and Boris Striepen. (2024) Genetic crosses within and between species of Cryptosporidium. PNAS doi:10.1073/pnas.2313210120
*Sivaranjani Namasivayam, Cheng Sun, Assiatu B Barrie, Wenyuan Xiao, ^#Erica M. Hall, *Jenna Oberstaller, Cedric Feschotte, Jessica C Kissingerand Ellen J Pritham. Massive invasion of organellar DNA drives nuclear genome evolution in Toxoplasma. (2023). PNAS doi:10.1073/pnas.2308569120.
Achchuthan Shanmugasundram, David Starns, Ulrike Böhme, Beatrice Amos, Paul Wilkinson, Omar S. Harb, Susanne Warrenfeltz, Jessica C. Kissinger, Mary Ann McDowell, David S. Roos, Kathryn Crouch and Andrew R. Jones. (2023) TriTrypDB: an integrated functional genomics resource for kinetoplastida. PloS NTD doi: 10.1371/journal.pntd.0011058
Danielle N. Farinella, Sukhpreet Kaur, ViLinh Tran, Monica Cabrera-Mora, Chester J. Joyner, Stacey A. Lapp, Suman Pakala, Mustafa V. Nural, Jeremy D. DeBarry, MaHPIC Consortium, Jessica C. Kissinger, Dean P. Jones, Alberto Moreno, Mary R. Galinski, Regina Joice Cordy. (2023) Malaria disrupts the rhesus macaque gut microbiome. Frontiers Cellular and Infection Microbiology. doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2022.1058926
Jeremy D. DeBarry, Mustafa V. Nural, Suman B. Pakala, Vishal Nayak, Susanne Warrenfeltz, Jay Humphrey, Stacey A. Lapp, Monica Cabrera-Mora, Cristiana F. A. Brito, Jianlin Jiang, Celia L. Saney, Allison Hankus, Hannah M. Stealey^#, Megan B. DeBarry, Nicolas Lackman, Noah Legall^#, Kevin Lee, Yan Tang, Anuj Gupta, Elizabeth D. Trippe, Robert R. Bridger, Daniel Brent Weatherly, Mariko S. Peterson, Xuntian Jiang, ViLinh Tran, Karan Uppal, Luis L. Fonseca, Chester J. Joyner, Ebru Karpuzoglu, Regina J. Cordy, Esmeralda V. S. Meyer, Lance L. Wells, Daniel S. Ory, F. Eun-Hyung Lee, Rabindra Tirouvanziam, Juan B. Gutiérrez, Chris Ibegbu, Tracey J. Lamb, Jan Pohl, Sarah T. Pruett, Dean P. Jones, Mark P. Styczynski, Eberhard O. Voit, Alberto Moreno, Mary R. Galinski & Jessica C. Kissinger. 2022. MaHPIC malaria systems biology data from Plasmodium cynomolgi sporozoite longitudinal infections in macaques. Scientific Data doi: 10.1038/s41597-022-01755-y.
Mariko S. Peterson, Chester J. Joyner, Stacey A. Lapp, Jessica A. Brady, Jennifer S. Wood, Monica Cabrera-Mora, Celia L. Saney, Luis L. Fonseca, Jianlin Jiang, Stephanie R. Soderberg, Mustafa V. Nural, Jay Humphrey, Allison Hankus, Deepa Machiah, Ebru Karpuzoglu, Jeremy D. DeBarry, MaHPIC Consortium, Rabindra Tirouvanziam, Jessica C. Kissinger, Alberto Moreno, Sanjeev Gumber, Eberhard O. Voit, Juan B. Gutierrez, Regina Joice Cordy and Mary R. Galinski. 2022. Plasmodium knowlesi cytoadhesion involves SICA variant proteins. Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology. doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2022.888496.
*Yiran Li, Rodrigo P. Baptista, Xiaohan Mei and Jessica C. Kissinger. 2022. Small and intermediate size structural RNAs in the unicellular parasite Cryptosporidium parvum as revealed by sRNA-Seq and comparative genomics. Microbial Genomics. doi: 10.1099/mgen.0.000821.
Rodrigo P. Baptista, *Yiran Li, Adam Sateriale, Mandy J. Sanders, Karen L. Brooks, Alan Tracey, Brendan R. E. Ansell, Aaron R. Jex, Garrett W. Cooper, Ethan D. Smith, Rui Xiao, Jennifer E. Dumaine, Matthew Berriman, Boris Striepen, James A. Cotton and Jessica C. Kissinger. 2022. Long-read assembly and comparative and evidence-based reanalysis of Cryptosporidium genome sequences reveal new biological insights. Genome Res. 2022 doi: 10.1101/gr.275325.121.
Amos B, Aurrecoechea C, Barba M, Barreto A, Basenko EY, Bażant W, Belnap R, Blevins AS, Böhme U, Brestelli J, Brunk BP, Caddick M, Callan D, Campbell L, Christensen MB, Christophides GK, Crouch K, Davis K, DeBarry J, Doherty R, Duan Y, Dunn M, Falke D, Fisher S, Flicek P, Fox B, Gajria B, Giraldo-Calderón GI, Harb OS, Harper E, Hertz-Fowler C, Hickman MJ, Howington C, Hu S, Humphrey J, Iodice J, Jones A, Judkins J, Kelly SA, Kissinger JC, Kwon DK, Lamoureux K, Lawson D, Li W, Lies K, Lodha D, Long J, MacCallum RM, Maslen G, McDowell MA, Nabrzyski J, Roos DS, Rund SSC, Schulman SW, Shanmugasundram A, Sitnik V, Spruill D, Starns D, Stoeckert CJ, Tomko SS, Wang H, Warrenfeltz S, Wieck R, Wilkinson PA, Xu L, Zheng J. 2022. VEuPathDB: the eukaryotic pathogen, vector and host bioinformatics resource center. Nucleic Acids Res. 2022 Jan 7;50(D1):D898-D911. doi: 10.1093/nar/gkab929.
Rodrigo P. Baptista, ^#Garrett W. Cooper and Jessica C. Kissinger. 2021. Challenges for Cryptosporidium population studies. Genes 2021, 12:894 doi.org/10.3390/genes12060894
*Sivaranjani Namasivayam, Wenyuan Xiao, Rodrigo P. Baptista, ^#Erica M. Hall, Joseph S. Doggett, Karin Troell and Jessica C. Kissinger. 2021. A novel fragmented mitochondrial genome in the protist pathogen Toxoplasma gondii and related tissue coccidia. Genome Research, doi:10.1101/gr.266403.120
Peterson MS, Joyner CJ, Brady JA, Wood JS, Cabrera-Mora M, Saney CL, Fonseca LL, Cheng WT, Jiang J, Lapp SA, Soderberg SR, Nural MV, Humphrey JC, Hankus A, Machiah D, Karpuzoglu E, DeBarry JD; MaHPIC-Consortium, Tirouvanziam R, Kissinger JC, Moreno A, Gumber S, Voit EO, Gutiérrez JB, Cordy RJ, Galinski MR. 2021. Clinical recovery of Macaca fascicularis infected with Plasmodium knowlesi. Malar J. 2021 Dec 30;20(1):486. doi: 10.1186/s12936-021-03925-6.