Unequal contribution of ALS9 alleles to adhesion between Candida albicans and human vascular endothelial cells.

ABSTRACT: The Candida albicans ALS (agglutinin-like sequence) family includes eight genes (ALS1 to ALS7, and ALS9) that share a common general organization, consisting of a relatively conserved 5' domain, a central domain of tandemly repeated sequence units, and a 3' domain of relatively variable length and sequence. To test the hypothesis that the cell-surface glycoproteins encoded by the ALS genes mediate contact between the fungal cell and host surfaces, a set of C. albicans mutant strains was systematically constructed, each lacking one of the ALS sequences. Phenotypes of the mutant strains were evaluated, primarily using adhesion assays. ALS9 is unique within the ALS family due to extensive allelic sequence variation within the 5' domain that may result in functional differences between protein

SUBMITTER: Zhao X 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2753836 | biostudies-literature | 2007 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature