Abstract
Candida albicans yeast forms deleted for ALS5, ALS6 or ALS7 are more adherent than a relevant control strain to human vascular endothelial cell monolayers and buccal epithelial cells. In the buccal and vaginal reconstituted human epithelium (RHE) disease models, however, mutant and control strains caused a similar degree of tissue destruction. Deletion of ALS5 or ALS6 significantly slowed growth of the mutant strain; this phenotype was not affected by addition of excess uridine to the culture medium. These studies demonstrate similar phenotypic characteristics for the als5Δ/als5Δ, als6Δ/als6Δ and als7Δ/als7Δ strains that are not observed in any of the other C. albicans alsΔ/alsΔ isolates.