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Candida albicans induces arginine biosynthetic genes in response to host-derived reactive oxygen species.

ABSTRACT: The interaction of Candida albicans with phagocytes of the host's innate immune system is highly dynamic, and its outcome directly impacts the progression of infection. While the switch to hyphal growth within the macrophage is the most obvious physiological response, much of the genetic response reflects nutrient starvation: translational repression and induction of alternative carbon metabolism. Changes in amino acid metabolism are not seen, with the striking exception of arginine biosynthesis, which is upregulated in its entirety during coculture with macrophages. Using single-cell reporters, we showed here that arginine biosynthetic genes are induced specifically in phagocytosed cells. This induction is lower in magnitude than during arginine starvation in vitro and is driven not by an arginine deficiency within the phagocyte but instead by exposure to reactive oxygen species (ROS). Curiously, these genes are induced in a narrow window of sublethal ROS concentrations. C. albicans cells phagocytosed by primary macrophages deficient in the gp91(phox) subunit of the phagocyte oxidase do not express the ARG pathway, indicating that the induction is dependent on the phagocyte oxidative burst. C. albicans arg pathway mutants are retarded in germ tube and hypha formation within macrophages but are not notably more sensitive to ROS. We also find that the ARG pathway is regulated not by the general amino acid control response but by transcriptional regulators similar to the Saccharomyces cerevisiae ArgR complex. In summary, phagocytosis induces this single amino acid biosynthetic pathway in an ROS-dependent manner.

SUBMITTER: Jimenez-Lopez C

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3535846 | biostudies-other | 2013 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

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Candida albicans induces arginine biosynthetic genes in response to host-derived reactive oxygen species.

Jiménez-López Claudia C Collette John R JR Brothers Kimberly M KM Shepardson Kelly M KM Cramer Robert A RA Wheeler Robert T RT Lorenz Michael C MC

Eukaryotic cell 20121109 1

The interaction of Candida albicans with phagocytes of the host's innate immune system is highly dynamic, and its outcome directly impacts the progression of infection. While the switch to hyphal growth within the macrophage is the most obvious physiological response, much of the genetic response reflects nutrient starvation: translational repression and induction of alternative carbon metabolism. Changes in amino acid metabolism are not seen, with the striking exception of arginine biosynthesis ...[more]

PMID: 23143683

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Candida albicans induces arginine biosynthetic genes in response to host-derived reactive oxygen species.

Publications

Candida albicans induces arginine biosynthetic genes in response to host-derived reactive oxygen species.

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