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The impact of fungi on human and plant health is an ever-increasing issue. Recent studies have estimated that human fungal infections result in an excess of one million deaths per year and plant fungal infections resulting in the loss of crop yields worth approximately 200 million per annum. Sexual reproduction in these economically important fungi has evolved in response to the environmental stresses encountered by the pathogens as a method to target DNA damage. Meiosis is integral to this process, through increasing diversity through recombination. Mating and meiosis have been extensively studied in the model yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae , highlighting that these mechanisms have diverged even between apparently closely related species. To further examine this, this review will inspect these mechanisms in emerging important fungal pathogens, such as Candida, Aspergillus , and Cryptococcus . It shows that both sexual and asexual reproduction in these fungi demonstrate a high degree of plasticity.

Polyenes act by permeabilising fungal cell membranes, resulting in cell death (Fig 1); resistance to polyenes occurs via altered sterol biosynthesis and damage to plasma membrane integrity. I glabrata i combines traits of genetic rewiring, cell wall modification, environmental adaptation, and intrinsic antifungal resistance to establish itself as a powerhouse of resistance against host and therapeutics. I glabrata i -specific gene expansions affecting cell wall organisation, where there are 6 copies of extracellular glycosylphosphatidylinositol-linked aspartyl proteases, 8 copies of alpha-1,3-mannosyltransferase involved in cell wall biogenesis, and a variable number of EPA (epithelial adhesin) genes located in subtelomeric regions [[2]]. 4: Antifungal drug resistance and the future of drug regimes The antifungal repertoire is limited to 4 extant and 2 novel drug classes with azoles, echinocandins, and polyenes and flucytosine (a nucleoside analogue with proven utility in combination regimes for I Cryptococcus i ) as the main classes. [Extracted from the article]

The trend for large-scale genetic and phenotypic screens has revealed a wealth of information on biological systems. A major challenge is understanding how genes function and putative roles in networks. The majority of current gene knowledge is garnered from studies utilising the model yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. We demonstrate that synthetic dosage lethal genetic array methodologies can be used to study genetic networks in other yeasts, namely the fungal pathogen Candida glabrata, which has limited forward genetic tools, due to the lack of 'natural' mating. We performed two SDL screens in S. cerevisiae, overexpressing the transcriptional regulator UME6 as bait in the first screen and its C. glabrata ortholog CAGL0F05357g in the second. Analysis revealed that SDL maps share 204 common interactors, with 10 genetic interactions unique to C. glabrata indicating a level of genetic rewiring, indicative of linking genotype to phenotype in fungal pathogens. This was further validated by incorporating our results into the global genetic landscape map of the cell from Costanzo et al. to identify common and novel gene attributes. This data demonstrated the utility large data sets and more robust analysis made possible by interrogating exogenous genes in the context of the eukaryotic global genetic landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]