The Genome of the Basidiomycetous Yeast and Human Pathogen Cryptococcus neoformans.

Cryptococcus neoformans is a basidiomycetous yeast ubiquitous inthe environment, a model for fungal pathogenesis, and an opportunistichuman pathogen of global importance. We have sequenced its∼20-megabase genome, which contains ∼6500 intron-rich genestructures and encodes a transcriptome abundant in alternatively splicedand antisense messages. The genome is rich in transposons, many of whichcluster at candidate centromeric regions. The presence of thesetransposons may drive karyotype instability and phenotypic variation. C.neoformans encodes unique genes that may contribute to its unusualvirulence properties, and comparison of two phenotypically distinctstrains reveals variation in gene content in addition to sequencepolymorphisms between the genomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]