CANDIDA ALBICANS SURFACE ANTIGENS

念珠菌已成为医院感染的第四大致病菌 血液感染。血液病的发生率 播散性和皮肤黏膜念珠菌病在#年继续上升 与免疫低下人群不断增加的同时 人民。假丝酵母菌的几种可能是导致这种 各种形式的念珠菌病，但目前为止白色念珠菌是最多的 普遍存在的原因。尽管这个物种很重要，但有 关于白念珠菌与宿主的相互作用，仍有许多需要了解。对许多人来说 多年来，人们普遍认为特定的抗体不起作用 对播散性念珠菌病的保护作用，即使 自20世纪60年代以来的一些论文认为，这种教条是错误的。 最近，在调查员实验室和一些人的实验室工作 其他人则强烈支持抗体与正确的 专一性是保护性的。最起码，重要的是 抗体需要仔细地重新评估。 研究人员的总体假设是，带有该病毒的抗体 正确的特异性有助于保护宿主免受念珠菌感染。这个 研究人员已经分离出两种与之发生反应的单抗 白念珠菌酵母细胞的细胞表面。两种抗体都是 IgM和两者都能凝集酵母细胞，但只有一种(单抗B6.1) 保护小鼠免受播散性念珠菌病和另一种(单抗 B6)不会。这个应用程序的主旨是研究 这些抗体所特有的和可能定义的表位 单抗B6.1保护小鼠的机制。为此， 调查员将执行以下具体目标。1. 鉴定单抗B6.1和单抗B6的表位 具体的。2.研究单抗B6.1可能的作用机制 保护，但单抗B6不能。3.确定抗体是否具有 正常人血清中存在单抗B6.1的特异性。 死于播散性疾病的患者和死于 已从播散性念珠菌病中康复。 这些研究应该会对白念珠菌宿主产生重要的见解 互动。这一结果可能会应用于预防， 可能是播散性念珠菌病的治疗。

Candida has become the fourth leading cause of nosocomial bloodstream infections. The incidence of hematogenous disseminated and mucocutaneous candidiasis continues to rise in parallel with tnhen increasing population of immunocompromised people. Several species of Candida may be responsible for the various forms of candidiasis, but C. Albicans is by far the most prevalent cause. Despite the importance of this species, there is still much to learn about C albicans-host interactions. For many years, the dogma has prevailed that specific antibodies do not play a protective role against disseminated candidiasis, even though some papers since the 1960s have suggested this dogma is wrong. Recently, work in the investigators laboratory and in those of a few others gives strong support that antibodies with the correct specificity are protective. At the very least, the importance of antibodies needs to be carefully re-evaluated. The investigators overall hypothesis is that antibodies with the correct specificity help protect the host against candidiasis. The investigator has isolated two monoclonal antibodies that react with the cell surface of C. Albicans yeast cells. Bothe antibodies are IgMs and both agglutinate yeast cells, but one (MAb B6.1) protects mice against disseminated candidiasis and the other (Mab B6) does not. The thrust of this application is to study the epitopes to which these antibodies are specific and define possible mechanisms by which Mab B6.1 protects mice. To this end, the Investigator will perform the following specific aims. 1. Characterize the epitopes to which Mab B6.1 and Mab B6 are specific. 2. Investigate possible mechanisms by which Mab B6.1 protects, but Mab B6 does not. 3. Determine if antibodies with Mab B6.1 specificity are present in sera of normal people, from patients who died of disseminated disease, and from patients who recovered from disseminated candidiasis. These studies should yield important insights into C. Albicans-host interactions. The results may become applied to prevention and, possibly, therapy of disseminated candidiasis.