Hemizygosity Enables a Mutational Transition Governing Fungal Virulence and Commensalism.

ABSTRACT: Candida albicans is a commensal fungus of human gastrointestinal and reproductive tracts, but also causes life-threatening systemic infections. The balance between colonization and pathogenesis is associated with phenotypic plasticity, with alternative cell states producing different outcomes in a mammalian host. Here, we reveal that gene dosage of a master transcription factor regulates cell differentiation in diploid C. albicans cells, as EFG1 hemizygous cells undergo a phenotypic transition inaccessible to "wild-type" cells with two functional EFG1 alleles. Notably, clinical isolates are often EFG1 hemizygous and thus licensed to undergo this transition. Phenotypic change corresponds to high-frequency loss of the functional EFG1 allele via de novo mutation or gene conversion events. Thi

SUBMITTER: Liang SH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6624852 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature