ANTIGENIC VARIATIONS OF CANDIDA-ALBICANS INVIVO AND INVITRO - RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN P-ANTIGENS AND SEROTYPES

  • 1 January 1983
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 21  (2) , 99-112
Abstract
Serum samples from patients with candidosis and from rabbits experimentally infected with serotype B C. albicans strains consistently showed higher antibody titers against Candida strains with serotype A antigens than strains with serotype B antigens, in indirect fluorescent antibody tests. When sera from rabbits infected with C. albicans serotype B strains were absorbed with blastospores of the homologous strain, they continued to react against strains of C. albicans serotype A and a C. tropicalis strain with serotype A antigens. Serotype A-specific antisera reacted against tissue forms of C. albicans serotype B in vivo and against serotype B germ tubes, but not their parent blastospores, in vitro. Apparently, C. albicans B serotype cells sometimes express, in vitro or in vivo, 1 or several antigens previously considered as specific to serotype A. The results have implications for the classical concept of C. albicans serotypes and for the serological diagnosis of candidosis in relation with the previously described strain P variable antigens.