THE ELECTROSTATIC NATURE OF THE CELL-SURFACE OF CANDIDA-ALBICANS - A ROLE IN ADHESION

The yeast form of Candida albicans is subjected to particle electrophoresis in a variety of media, in order to determine whether the cell surface of the fungus conforms to a simple electrostatic system. It is found that C. albicans behaves essentially as a simple charged colloidal system. Similar measurements were performed with various glass surfaces in order to identify whether electrostatic interactions have any bearing on fungal adhesion. It was found that under all the circumstances studied, the fungi and glass were electronegative; the degree of adhesion was found to be affected by the magnitude of the coulombic repulsion. Significant adhesion still occurred, however, even when the coulombic repulsion was a maximum; this was taken to indicate that the fungal surface possesses other nonelectrostatic forces which are attractive. Both the electrostatic repulsive and the nonelectrostatic (presumably nonpolar) forces are considered to play a role in the adhesion of fungi to each other, to artificial surfaces such as glass, and presumably to other surfaces which occur in living systems. (C) 1994 Academic Press, Inc.