Isolation of a variant of Candida albicans

Abstract

During the course of Candida albicans antigen production, a variant of this organism was encountered which did not produce hyphae at 37°C. Presented here are some of the characteristics of this variant. It produces hyphae at 25°C on cornmeal agar and synthetic medium plus N-acetylglucosamine and Tween 80. At 37°C, it does not produce hyphae on these media, although C. albicans normally does produce hyphae under these circumstances. In liquid synthetic medium, this variant does not produce hyphae at 37°C. The variant strain was analyzed for DNA, RNA, protein content, and particle size. After 50 to 70 h in balanced exponential-phase growth, particle size distribution was narrow, and there were no differences in the DNA, RNA, or protein content per particle in the two strains. When balanced exponential-phase cultures were brought into stationary phase, both strains contained the same amount of DNA per cell.