The dermatophyte Trichophyton rubrum is the major fungal pathogen of skin, hair, and nails that uses keratinized substrates as the primary nutrients during infection. Few strategies are available that permit a better understanding of the molecular me...
Morphological changes are a very common and effective strategy for pathogens to survive in the mammalian host. During interactions with their host, human pathogenic fungi undergo an array of morphological changes that are tightly associated with viru...
The incidence of human infections caused by the opportunistic fungal pathogen Candida albicans is on the rise due to increasing numbers of immunosuppressed patients. The importance of the immune system in preventing overgrowth of the colonizing fungu...
The prevalence of fungal diseases is increasing on a global scale, ranging from acute to systemic infections caused by commensal or pathogenic microorganisms, often associated with the immune status of the host. Morbidity and mortality rates remain h...
Scedosporium and Lomentospora are a group of filamentous fungi with some clinically relevant species causing either localized, invasive, or disseminated infections. Understanding how the host immune response is activated and how fungi interact with t...
Post-translational modifications (PTMs) change the structure and function of proteins and regulate a diverse array of biological processes. Fungal pathogens rely on PTMs to modulate protein production and activity during infection, manipulate the hos...
With the advent of high-throughput sequencing techniques, the astonishing extent and complexity of the microbial communities that reside within and upon us has begun to become clear. Moreover, with advances in computing and modelling methods, we are...
The burden of fungal infections is not widely appreciated. Although these infections are responsible for over one million deaths annually, it is estimated that one billion people are affected by severe fungal diseases. Mycoses of nails and skin, prim...
Histoplasma capsulatum affects healthy and immunocompromised individuals, sometimes causing a severe disease. This fungus has two morphotypes, the mycelial (infective) and the yeast (parasitic) phases. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small RNAs involved in th...
Filamentous fungal pathogens have evolved diverse strategies to infect a variety of hosts including plants and insects. The dynamic infection process requires rapid and fine-tuning regulation of fungal gene expression programs in response to the chan...
Opportunistic human pathogenic fungi including the saprotrophic mold Aspergillus fumigatus and the human commensal Candida albicans can cause severe fungal infections in immunocompromised or critically ill patients. The first line of defense against...
The cabbage looper Trichoplusia ni is an important agricultural pest worldwide and is frequently used as a model organism for assessing entomopathogenic fungi virulence, though few studies have measured the host response repertoire to fungal biocontr...
Ectomycorrhizal (EM) associations are essential symbiotic relationships that contribute significantly to the health and functioning of forest ecosystems. This review examines the biotic factors that influence EM associations, focusing on plant and fu...
Claviceps purpurea is a highly specialized biotrophic ascomycete that colonizes floral tissues of grasses, including economically important cereal crops, causing ergot disease and producing ergot alkaloids with significant agricultural, pharmaceutica...
Aspergillus fumigatus spores initiate more than 3,000,000 chronic and 300,000 invasive diseases annually, worldwide. Depending on the immune status of the host, inhalation of these spores can lead to a broad spectrum of disease, including invasive as...
The pathogenesis of fungal and bacterial microbes is a complex process involving distinct parameters, including virulence factors, nutrient sensing and availability, microbial signals, as well as host status and defense responses. Defining pathogenes...
The advent of sequencing technology has endowed us with the capacity to study microbes constituting the human commensal community that were previously non-culturable. Much of the initial works have concentrated on the bacterial flora constituting the...
Sporothrix schenckii is a thermodimorphic fungus and one of the main etiological agents of sporotrichosis, a globally distributed subcutaneous mycosis that primarily affects the skin, subcutaneous tissue, and lymphatic system. Historically regarded a...
The fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda, is a globally distributed agricultural pest. Metarhizium robertsii is an entomopathogenic fungus (EPF) with great application potential for the biological control of S. frugiperda. Nevertheless, to date, ther...
Cryptococcosis often begins in the lungs and may later reach the central nervous system, where it can lead to severe or fatal disease. The course of infection is shaped by changing interactions between host cells, fungal adaptive states, and local ti...
The fungal pathogen, Cryptococcus neoformans, causes devastating levels of morbidity and mortality. Infections with this fungus tend to be predominantly in immunocompromised individuals, such as those with HIV. Infections initiate with inhalation of...
Immune inertness of Aspergillusfumigatus conidia is attributed to its surface rodlet-layer made up of RodAp, characterized by eight conserved cysteine residues forming four disulfide bonds. Earlier, we showed that the conserved cysteine residue point...
Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi are biotrophic symbionts forming close relationships with an estimated 80% of terrestrial plants suitable as their host. Via an established AM fungal–host relationship, soil-bound nutrients are made available to the...
Sporothrix schenckii is one of the etiological agents of sporotrichosis, a cutaneous and subcutaneous infection distributed worldwide. Like other medically relevant fungi, its cell wall is a molecular scaffold to display virulence factors, such as pr...
In the study of fungal pathogenesis, alternative methods have gained prominence due to recent global legislation restricting the use of mammalian animals in research. The principle of the 3 Rs (replacement, reduction, and refinement) is integrated in...
Fungi represent a common and diverse part of the microbial communities that associate with plants. They also commonly colonise various plant parts asymptomatically. The molecular mechanisms of these interactions are, however, poorly understood. In th...
Ectophosphatases are surface membrane-bound proteins whose active sites face the extracellular medium. These enzymes have been reported in several microorganisms including a large number of medically relevant fungal species. An effective technique fo...
The exocyst complex, an evolutionarily conserved octameric protein assembly, plays a central role in the targeted binding and fusion of vesicles at the plasma membrane. In fungal cells, this transport system is essential for polarized growth, morphog...
30 September 2026
Severe fungal diseases are an increasingly important yet underrecognized cause of global morbidity and mortality, with the greatest impact among immunocompromised individuals and populations with limited access to timely diagnosis and treatment. Dise...
Immunocompromised individuals are at high risk of developing severe fungal infections with high mortality rates, while fungal pathogens pose little risk to most healthy people. Poor therapeutic outcomes and growing antifungal resistance pose further...
Animal models are frequently used as surrogates to understand human disease. In the fungal pathogen Cryptococcus species complex, several variations of a mouse model of disease were developed that recapitulate different aspects of human disease. Thes...
Non-albicans Candida (NAC) species have emerged as clinically important opportunistic pathogens with distinct ecological, physiological, and pathogenic traits. Successful colonization and infection require these yeasts to survive within heterogeneous...
Symbiosis between microbes and insects has been raised as a promising area for understanding biological implications of microbe–host interactions. Among them, the association between fungi and bark beetles has been generally recognized as essential f...
Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) remains a major global health burden with limited improvement in survival rates. While traditional risk factors such as tobacco and alcohol are well established, increasing evidence highlights the role of the oral...
Epipolythiodioxopiperazines (ETPs), characterized by a diketopiperazine (DKP) core bridged by disulfide or polysulfide bonds, exhibit exceptional structural diversity and functional adaptability. This review comprehensively explores their multifacete...
The ability of entomopathogenic fungi, such as Beauveria bassiana, to infect insects by penetrating their cuticle is well documented. However, some insects have evolved mechanisms to combat fungal infections. The red flour beetle (Tribolium castaneum...
Pine wilt disease (PWD), caused by pinewood nematode (PWN) Bursaphelenchus xylophilus, is globally one of the most destructive diseases of pine forests, especially in China. However, little is known about the effect of PWD on the host microbiome. In...
Fusarium species are ubiquitous fungi, both saprotrophic and pathogenic to plants, animals and humans. They are also potent mycotoxin producers which makes them one of the most devastating plant pathogens. Mycotoxin biosynthesis and regulation has re...
As disease outbreaks in forest plantations are causing concern worldwide, a clear understanding of the influence of silvicultural practices on the development of epidemics is still lacking. Importantly, silvicultural practices are likely to simultane...
Cryptococcus sp. are basidiomycete yeasts which can be found widely, free-living in the environment. Interactions with natural predators, such as amoebae in the soil, are thought to have promoted the development of adaptations enabling the organism t...
Fungal infections caused by Candida, Aspergillus, and Cryptococcus species are an increasing problem worldwide, associated with very high mortality rates. The successful prevalence of these human pathogens is due to their ability to thrive in stressf...
Nematophagous fungi (NFs), which are responsible for soil suppression of plant-parasitic nematodes, are multitrophic biocontrol agents. This raises the question of the transition between lifestyles (e.g., endophytism vs. egg parasitism). The NF Pocho...
Pathogens are able to deliver small-secreted, cysteine-rich proteins into plant cells to enable infection. The computational prediction of effector proteins remains one of the most challenging areas in the study of plant fungi interactions. At presen...
Mating-types allow single-celled eukaryotic organisms to distinguish self from non-self in preparation for sexual reproduction. The components of mating-type loci provide initial self/non-self-recognition through pheromone and receptor interactions t...
Candida auris was reported by the WHO as second to Cryptococcus neoformans, in the list of nineteen fungal priority pathogens, along with two species with a new nomenclature, Nakaseomyces glabrata (Candida glabrata) and Pichia kudriavzevii (Candida k...
Recent studies have shown that several pathogens manipulate ferroptosis in host cells to aid their dissemination and enhance pathogenicity. While bacterial virulence factors capable of inducing ferroptosis have been identified, no such factors have b...
Cryptococcus species are encapsulated fungi found in the environment that predominantly cause disease in immunocompromised hosts after inhalation into the lungs. Even with contemporary antifungal regimens, patients with cryptococcosis continue to hav...
Antibody immunity is now known to play a critical role in combating mycotic infections. The identification of molecules that can elicit an antibody response against fungal pathogens is the first step in developing antibody-based therapeutic strategie...
Aspergillus fumigatus is a disease-causing, opportunistic fungus that can establish infection due to its capacity to respond to a wide range of environmental conditions. Secreted proteins and metabolites, which play a critical role in fungal–ho...
The secreted aspartic peptidases (Saps) of Candida albicans play crucial roles in various steps of fungal–host interactions. Using a flow cytometry approach, this study investigated the expression of Saps1–3 antigens after (i) incubation...
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