PHOTO BY RICHARD ANDERSON
Judith
Berman, genetics, cell biology and development
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How
do we fight an infection when the current medications may only lead
to it building resistance? This is an issue in the case of
Candida, yeast living in about 80 percent of people. Judith Berman,
professor of genetics, cell biology and development, and her research
team are working on a solution.
Candida is normally controlled by the immune system, sometimes causing
treatable surface infections in healthy people. But in those with
weakened immune systems, it can cause blood stream infections that
result in 10,000 deaths each year in the U.S. Doctors fight Candida
with antifungal medications, but lose the battle up to 40 percent
of the time.
Drugs that are toxic to yeast are often toxic to humans, so antifungal
drugs are used at concentrations that suppress,
rather than kill, Candida. This enables the yeast to evolve resistance
to the drug to survive, and is similar to chromosome modifications
that occur in some cancers.
Berman’s team found that Candida yeast modifies a chromosome
to help tolerate antifungal medications. They intend to find the
mechanisms behind this—how the chromosome modification occurs
and how it allows the yeast to
survive. They hope this will lead to the development of a companion
drug to block the formation of modified chromosomes or to eliminate
them, in cells that become resistant to antifungal drugs as well
as in cancer cells.
By Amy Danielson
Excerpted from Research,
an annual publication of the Office of the Vice President for Research.
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