Publications

The genome of the basidiomycetous yeast and human pathogen Cryptococcus neoformans

Loftus BJ, Fung E, Roncaglia P, Rowley D, Amedeo P, Bruno D, Vamathevan J, Miranda M, Anderson IJ, Fraser JA, Allen JE, Bosdet IE, Brent MR, Chiu R, Doering TL, Donlin MJ, D'Souza CA, Fox DS, Grinberg V, Fu J, Fukushima M, Haas BJ, Huang JC, Janbon G, Jones SJ, Koo HL, Krzywinski MI, Kwon-Chung JK, Lengeler KB, Maiti R, Marra MA, Marra RE, Mathewson CA, Mitchell TG, Pertea M, Riggs FR, Salzberg SL, Schein JE, Shvartsbeyn A, Shin H, Shumway M, Specht CA, Suh BB, Tenney A, Utterback TR, Wickes BL, Wortman JR, Wye NH, Kronstad JW, Lodge JK, Heitman J, Davis RW, Fraser CM, Hyman RW

PMID: 15653466

Abstract

Cryptococcus neoformans is a basidiomycetous yeast ubiquitous in the environment, a model for fungal pathogenesis, and an opportunistic human pathogen of global importance. We have sequenced its approximately 20-megabase genome, which contains approximately 6500 intron-rich gene structures and encodes a transcriptome abundant in alternatively spliced and antisense messages. The genome is rich in transposons, many of which cluster at candidate centromeric regions. The presence of these transposons may drive karyotype instability and phenotypic variation. C. neoformans encodes unique genes that may contribute to its unusual virulence properties, and comparison of two phenotypically distinct strains reveals variation in gene content in addition to sequence polymorphisms between the genomes.