Immunological and Toxic Differences between Mouse-virulent and Mouse-avirulent Candida Albicans.

Isenberg, Henry D. (Long Island Jewish Hospital, New Hyde Park, N.Y.), Jona Allerhand, James I. Berkman, and Dorothy Goldberg. Immunological and toxic differences between mouse-virulent and mouse-avirulent Candida albicans. J. Bacteriol. 86:1010-1018. 1963.-The differences between mouse-avirulent and -virulent strains of Candida albicans reside at least in part in cell surface materials which can be extracted with solvents such as ethanolethyl ether and phenol. These extracts are complex haptens which behave like endotoxins in mice and rabbits. Antibodies produced against intact and extracted cells show some strain specificity in agglutination and precipitin reactions, but underline primarily the differences between the virulent and avirulent variants. The chemical constitution of the extracted complex haptens suggests that the toxic or virulent principles are polysaccharide in nature and that the avirulent strain substitutes fats and lipids for some polysaccharides on their cell surface.