Entamoeba invadens is capable of causing invasive disease similar to that resulting from E. histolytica infection. However, the diseased host is a reptile, most often a snake or a lizard. It is thought that turtles act as reservoir hosts in which the infection is asymptomatic. E. invadens is studied primarily as a model for encystation, as this species can be induced to encyst in axenic culture while E. histolytica cannot. The strain being studied is IP-1, which was isolated from a Green Water Snake (Natrix cyclopion).

As part of the comparative Entamoeba sequencing project we have produced 21000 sequences from E. invadens. These raw sequence reads are now available for FTP download and BLAST searching.