the candida albicans dse1 protein is essential and plays a role in cell wall rigidity, biofilm formation, and virulence白色念珠菌dse1蛋白是至关重要的,扮演一个角色在细胞壁的刚性,生物膜的形成和毒性.pdfVIP

Hindawi Publishing Corporation Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Infectious Diseases Volume 2011, Article ID 504280, 9 pages doi:10.1155/2011/504280 Research Article The Candida albicans Dse1 Protein Is Essential and Plays a Role in Cell Wall Rigidity, Biofilm Formation, and Virulence Jalil Y. Daher, Joseph Koussa, Samer Younes, and Roy A. Khalaf Natural Sciences Department, Lebanese American University, P.O. Box 36, Byblos, Lebanon Correspondence should be addressed to Roy A. Khalaf, roy.khalaf@.lb Received 27 January 2011; Accepted 28 April 2011 Academic Editor: Deborah Dean Copyright © 2011 Jalil Y. Daher et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The fungal pathogen Candida albicans is one of the leading causative agents of death in immunocompromised individuals. It harbors an arsenal of cell wall anchored factors that are implicated in virulence such as filamentation inducing factors, adhesins, lipases, proteases, and superoxide dismutases. Dse1 is a cell wall protein involved in cell wall metabolism. The purpose of this study is to characterize the role Dse1 plays in virulence. Dse1 appears to be an essential gene as no homozygous null mutant was possible. The heterozygote mutant exhibited increased susceptibility to calcofluor white, a cell wall disrupting agent, with a subsequent reduction in cell wall chitin content, decreased oxidative stress tolerance, a 30% reduction in biofilm formation, and a delay in adhesion that was mirrored by a reduction in virulence in a mouse model of infection. Dse1 thus appears to be an important protein involved in cell wall integrity and rigidity. 1. Introduction