Identification of allele specific function of Candida ablicans Pseudouridine Synthase 4

Abstract

Candida albicans is the most prevalent human fungal pathogen. Unfortunately, there still remains much that is unknown about it, including the reason for maintaining a diploid genome and the function of many genes. In this thesis I describe the phenotypic consequences of up and downregulating Pseudouridine Synthase 4 (PUS4) of C. albicans, as well as an examination of the differences in the expression level of the entire transcriptome. These experiments and resulting bioinformatic analysis have lead to our conclusion that that PUS4A is more lowly transcribed than PUS4B. This data suggests PUS4A may be nonfunctional or play a different role in C. albicans biology.