Rapid and extensive karyotype diversification in haploid clinical Candida auris isolates

TY - JOUR

T1 - Rapid and extensive karyotype diversification in haploid clinical Candida auris isolates

AU - Bravo Ruiz, Gustavo

AU - Ross, Zoe K.

AU - Schelenz, Silke

AU - Gow, Neil A. R.

AU - Lorenz, Alexander

N1 - Open access via the Springer Compact Agreement. We are grateful to Arunaloke Chakrabarti, Anuradha Chowdhary, Elizabeth Johnson (PHE), Takashi Kubota, and Shawn Lockhart (CDC) for providing strains. Flow cytometry was performed at the Iain Fraser Cytometry Centre (IFCC), University of Aberdeen (Raif Yuecel). This work was funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC) Centre for Medical Mycology at the University of Aberdeen (MR/P501955/1), a Wellcome Trust Institutional Strategic Support Fund grant awarded to the University of Aberdeen (204815/Z/16/Z), a Tenovus Scotland project grant (G17.02), a Royal Society Research Grant (RG140254) to AL, and Wellcome Trust Strategic Award, Senior Investigator and Collaborative Awards (080088, 086827, 075470, 099215, and 097377) to NARG.

PY - 2019/4/24

Y1 - 2019/4/24

N2 - Candida auris is a newly emerging pathogenic microbe, having been identified as a medically relevant fungus as recently as 2009. It is the most drug-resistant yeast species known to date and its emergence and population structure are unusual. Because of its recent emergence we are largely ignorant about fundamental aspects of its general biology, life cycle, and population dynamics. Here we report the karyotype variability of 26 C. auris strains representing the four main clades. We demonstrate that all strains are haploid and have a highly plastic karyotype containing five to seven chromosomes, which can undergo marked alterations within a short time-frame when the fungus is put under genotoxic, heat, or osmotic stress. No simple correlation was found between karyotype pattern, drug resistance, and clade affiliation indicating that karyotype heterogeneity is rapidly evolving. As with other Candida species, these marked karyotype differences between isolates are likely to have an important impact on pathogenic traits of C. auris.

AB - Candida auris is a newly emerging pathogenic microbe, having been identified as a medically relevant fungus as recently as 2009. It is the most drug-resistant yeast species known to date and its emergence and population structure are unusual. Because of its recent emergence we are largely ignorant about fundamental aspects of its general biology, life cycle, and population dynamics. Here we report the karyotype variability of 26 C. auris strains representing the four main clades. We demonstrate that all strains are haploid and have a highly plastic karyotype containing five to seven chromosomes, which can undergo marked alterations within a short time-frame when the fungus is put under genotoxic, heat, or osmotic stress. No simple correlation was found between karyotype pattern, drug resistance, and clade affiliation indicating that karyotype heterogeneity is rapidly evolving. As with other Candida species, these marked karyotype differences between isolates are likely to have an important impact on pathogenic traits of C. auris.

KW - Candida auris

KW - chromosome number

KW - chromosome size

KW - genome size

KW - rRNA genes

KW - Genome size

KW - Chromosome size

KW - Chromosome number

KW - Karyotype evolution

UR - https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/514745v1

UR - http://www.mendeley.com/research/rapid-extensive-karyotype-diversification-haploid-clinical-candida-auris-isolates

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85064813898&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1101/514745

DO - 10.1101/514745

M3 - Article

SP - 1

EP - 12

JO - Current Genetics

JF - Current Genetics

SN - 0172-8083

ER -