Affiliation:
1. Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, State University of New York, Stony Brook, New York 11794-5222
2. Department of Microbiology, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996-0845
Abstract
ABSTRACT
Hyphal growth of
Candida albicans
is implicated as an important virulence factor for this opportunistic human pathogen. Septin proteins, a family of cytoskeletal elements that regulate membrane events and are important for proper morphogenesis of
C
.
albicans
, were examined for their role in tissue invasion and virulence in the mouse model of systemic infection. In vitro, septin mutants are only mildly defective for hyphal growth in liquid culture but display pronounced defects for invasive growth into agar. In vivo, the septin mutants were found to exhibit attenuated virulence. However, mice infected with the mutants displayed high fungal burdens in their kidneys without obvious symptoms of disease. Histological examination of infected kidneys revealed defects in organ invasion for the
cdc10Δ
and
cdc11Δ
deletion mutants, which displayed both reduced tissue penetration and noninvasive fungal masses. Thus, the septin proteins are necessary for invasive growth, which appears to be more important to the successful pathogenesis of
C
.
albicans
than hyphal growth alone.
Publisher
American Society for Microbiology
Subject
Infectious Diseases,Immunology,Microbiology,Parasitology
Cited by
77 articles.
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