Abstract:The opportunistic fungal pathogen, Candida albicans, is a significant medical threat, especially for immunocompromised patients. Experimental research has focused on specific areas of C. albicans biology with the goal of understanding the multiple factors that contribute to its pathogenic potential. Some of these factors include cell adhesion, invasive or filamentous growth and the formation of drug resistant biofilms.The Gene Ontology (GO; www.geneontology.org) is a standardized vocabulary that the Candida Genome Database (CGD; www.candidagenome.org) and other groups use to describe the function of gene products. To improve the breadth and accuracy of pathogenicity-related gene product descriptions and to facilitate the description of as-yet uncharacterized but potential pathogenicity-related genes in Candida species, CGD has undertaken a three-part project: first, the addition of terms to the Biological Process branch of the GO to improve the description of fungal-related processes; second, manual recuration of gene product annotations in CGD to use the improved GO vocabulary; and third, computational ortholog-based transfer of GO annotations from experimentally characterized gene products using these new terms to uncharacterized orthologs in other Candida species.Through genome annotation and analysis, we identified candidate pathogenicity genes in seven non-albicans Candida species and in one additional C. albicans strain, WO-1. We also defined a set of the C. albicans genes at the intersection of biofilm formation, filamentous growth, pathogenesis and phenotypic switching of this opportunistic fungal pathogen, which provide a compelling list of candidates for further experimentation.

Status: Published Type: Journal Article PubMed ID: 23143685

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#1-10(ACE2-CPH1) #11-20(CYR1-NDT80) #21-30(NOT4-TEC1) #31-32(TPK2-VAM3)

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Jump to Summary Chart for:

#1-10(ACE2-CPH1) #11-20(CYR1-NDT80) #21-30(NOT4-TEC1) #31-32(TPK2-VAM3)

• To find other papers on a gene and topic, click on the colored ball in the appropriate box.
  displays other papers with information about that topic for that gene.
  displays other papers in CGD that are associated with that topic.
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• To go to the Locus page for a gene, click on the gene name.