GSE38298
RNA sequencing revealed novel actors of the acquisition of drug resistance in Candida albicans
Drug susceptible clinical isolates of Candida albicans frequently become highly tolerant to drugs during chemotherapy, with dreadful consequences on patient health. We used RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) to analyze the transcriptomes of a CDR (Candida Drug Resistance) strain and its isogenic drug sensitive counterpart. RNA-seq unveiled differential expression of 228 genes including a) genes  previously identified as involved in CDR, b) genes not previously associated to the CDR phenotype, and c) novel transcripts whose function as a gene is uncharacterized. In particular, we show for the first time that CDR acquisition is correlated with an overexpression of the transcription factor encoding gene CZF1. CZF1 null mutants were sensitive to many drugs, independently of known multidrug resistance mechanisms. We show that CZF1 acts as a repressor of ß-glucan synthesis, thus negatively regulating cell wall integrity. Finally, our RNA-seq data allowed us to identify a new transcribed region, upstream of the TAC1 gene, which encodes the major CDR transcriptional regulator. Our results open new perspectives to the role of Czf1 and to our understanding of the transcriptional and post-transcriptional mechanisms that lead to the acquisition of drug resistance in C. albicans, with potential future improvements of therapeutic strategies. Overall design: RNA sequencing was performed on 2 Candida albicans strains (Gu4 and Gu5). For each strain, we sequenced 2 biological replicates.