yeast-congress-2018-scientifictracks

11 / 16

Page 32
Notes:
alliedacademies
Archives of Industrial Biotechnology | Volume 2
May 14-15, 2018 | Montreal, Canada
World Yeast Congress
Candida albicans still remains the most prevalent fungal
pathogen in humans. The MAP-kinase HOG1 pathway
playsanessential role in thepathobiologyof thisopportunistic
yeast, including the colonization of the gastrointestinal
tract in mouse or the defensive response against several
environmental injuries. The latter, encompass mechanisms
to face both oxidative and osmotic stress treatments.
Here, we show that one of the main components of this
defensive response consists of the intracellular protective
accumulation of the non-reducing disaccharide trehalose
and two polyols, glycerol and D-arabitol, an accumulation
that occurs in a stress-specific dependent manner. Thus,
oxidative exposures promoted a marked increase in both
trehalose and D-arabitol in the wild type strain, RM-100 (and
several standard genetic backgrounds), whereas the glycerol
content remained virtually unaffected with respect to basal
(untreated) levels. In contrast, osmotic challenges induced
the significant storage of glycerol accompanied by minor
changes, or even a slight drop, in the intracellular content
of trehalose and D-arabitol. We examined the hypothetical
role in this process of the MAP kinase Hog1, which regulates
the protective responses in C. albicans against both oxidative
and osmotic stress. Interestingly, unlike glycerol synthesis,
the stress-induced trehalose accumulation was always Hog1-
independent, whereas the ability to synthesize D-arabitol
was only partially dependent on a functional Hog1 pathway,
at least under our experimental conditions.
Speaker Biography
J C Argüelles has completed his PhD in Biology (1987) at the University of Murcia and
Post-doctoral studies from Institute of Biomedicine (CSIC, Madrid, Spain) and from the
Laboratory of Molecular Cell Biology at the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium).
He is currently working as Professor of Microbiology and has published more than
50 papers in reputed journals and has been serving as an Editorial Board Member.
Furthermore, he is also engaged in the Social and Humanistic Features of Science,
has published two books on Scientific Historiography; participated on Forums on the
Dissemination of Science and is a writer of popular science articles in some leading
newspapers.
e:
Specific synthesis of trehalose and polyols are protective factors against environmental stress in
Candida albicans
J C Argüelles, R Sánchez-Fresneda, V Pujante, A Argüelles and J P Guirao-Abad
University of Murcia, Spain