Intravital Imaging of Candida albicans Identifies Differential <i>In Vitro</i> and <i>In Vivo</i> Filamentation Phenotypes for Transcription Factor Deletion Mutants
Rohan S. Wakade, Manning Y. Huang, Aaron P. Mitchell, Melanie Wellington, Damian J. Krysan
Abstract
Candida albicans is one of the most common causes of fungal infections in humans. C. albicans undergoes a transition from a round yeast form to a filamentous form during infection, which is critical for its ability to cause disease. Although this transition has been studied in the laboratory for years, methods to do so in an animal model of infection have been limited. We have developed a microscopy method to visualize fluorescently labeled C. albicans undergoing this transition in the subcutaneous tissue of mice. Our studies indicate that the regulation of C. albicans filamentation during infection is distinct from that observed in laboratory conditions.