Ploidy Variation and Spontaneous Haploid-Diploid Switching of Candida glabrata Clinical Isolates
Qiushi Zheng, Jing Liu, Juanxiu Qin, Bingjie Wang, Jian Bing, Han Du, Min Li, Fangyou Yu, Guanghua Huang
Abstract
The human fungal pathogen Candida glabrata has long been thought to be a haploid organism. Here, we report the population structure and ploidy states of 500 clinical isolates of C. glabrata from China. To our surprise, we found that the ploidy of a subset of clinical isolates varied dramatically. Some isolates were in or able to switch to an aneuploid, diploid, or hyperdiploid form. C. glabrata cells with different ploidy differed in a number of biological respects, including morphology, antifungal susceptibility, virulence, and global gene expression profile. Given the absence of an apparent sexual phase in this fungus, we propose that ploidy switching could be a strategy for rapid adaptation to environmental changes and could function as an alternative to sexual reproduction.