From evaluation of each candidate gene, AQP9 which belongs to the aquaglyceroporin subfamily, a transmembrane channel protein that conducts water and glycerol (Liu et al., 2007), was selected for functional investigations, because it was among the most downregulated genes in the non-permissive HepG2 cells (Figure 1A and Supplementary Figure 3A), and evidence from a previous study showed it to be involved in mouse susceptibility to P. berghei blood stage infection (Liu et al., 2007). This evidence concerns the gene AQP9 and infection.