Researchers develop new approach to tackle fungal pathogens

A team of researchers from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has developed a one-of-a-kind approach to fight the fungal pathogen called ‘Candida albicans’ (CAL).
Candida albicans is the primary cause of systemic candidiasis- a major global health threat with a high mortality rate up to 63.6 per cent in severe cases.
The researchers, including those from Wadhwani School of Data Science and AI (WSAI) and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras, developed a multidisciplinary approach to identify some of the critical metabolic pathways that can be targeted to modulate the virulence of the pathogen.
The team combined large-scale computational modelling and experimental validation to identify unknown critical metabolic vulnerabilities in CAL.
“Unlike other studies, the one-of-a-kind integrated host-fungal metabolic model combined the CAL model iRV781 with the human metabolic model Recon3D,” said corresponding author and principal investigator Dr. Susan Thomas from ICMR-NIRRCH, Mumbai.
This allowed the researchers to simulate how CAL metabolism responds during a host infection, identify and reveal hidden metabolic vulnerabilities not evident in laboratory cultures, and highlight the role of arginine metabolism in CAL pathogenicity, Thomas explained.