Chapter 5 - Prediction of infection-associated genes via a cellular molecular network approach: A Candida albicans infection case study

Abstract

Candida albicans is found to be the most prevalent opportunistic fungal pathogen in humans causing superficial and serious systemic infections. In general, the infection process can be divided into three stages: adhesion, invasion, and host cell damage. To enhance the understanding of these C. albicans infection stages, this chapter aimed to predict phenotype-associated genes involved during these three infection stages and to investigate their roles in C. albicans–host interactions. In light of the principles that proteins that lie closer to one another in a protein interaction network are more likely to have similar functions, and that genes regulated by the same transcription factors tend to have similar functions, a cellular molecular network approach was proposed to predict the phenotype-associated genes in the C. albicans infection in this chapter. A total of 4, 12, and 3 genes are predicted as adhesion-, invasion-, and damage-associated genes during C. albicans infection, respectively. These predicted genes highlight the facts that cell surface components are crucial for cell adhesion, and that morphogenesis is critical for cell invasion during C. albicans infection. In addition, they might provide targets for further investigations into the pathogenic mechanisms of the three C. albicans infection stages. These results gain insights into the responses elicited in C. albicans during interaction with the host, to provide possible biomarkers for drug targets in identifying novel therapies to treat C. albicans infection.