Open AccessAntifungal activity of biosynthesized silver nanoparticles from Candida albicans on the strain lacking the CNP41 gene
Author(s) -
Darshan Dhabalia,
Shareefraza J. Ukkund,
Usman Taqui Syed,
Wasim Uddin,
M. Anaul Kabir
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
materials research express
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2053-1591
DOI - 10.1088/2053-1591/abcc83
Subject(s) - candida albicans , corpus albicans , fluconazole , microbiology and biotechnology , strain (injury) , silver nanoparticle , antifungal drug , yeast , chemistry , gene , antifungal , nanoparticle , biology , materials science , biochemistry , nanotechnology , anatomy
The upsurge of immunocompromised patients has led to extensive study of fungal infections with Candida albicans being the frontline model of pathogenic yeast in humans. In the quest to find novel antifungal agents, this study reports the potential usage of wild-type C. albicans strain C86 to biosynthesise silver nanoparticles by microwave assisted technique. Visual colour change and UV-spectrophotometer were used for primary detection of silver nanoparticles. Additionally, the FTIR peaks confirm the particles’ formation and surface characterisation techniques such as FESEM and EDX suggests that the silver nanoparticles were sized in the range of 30–70 nm. Furthermore, pioneering work of homologous recombination technique was systematically employed to delete uncharacterized gene orf 19.3120 (CNP 41) in the C86 strain creating the deletion strain C403 of C. albicans . To amalgamate the two significant findings, biosynthesized silver nanoparticles were subjected to antifungal studies by disk diffusion assay on the strain C403 that lacks the gene orf 19.3120 (CNP 41) of C. albicans . As a synergetic approach, combinational effect was studied by incorporating antifungal drug fluconazole. Both individual and enhanced combinational antifungal effects of silver nanoparticles and fluconazole were observed on genetically modified C403 strain with 40% increase in fold area compared to wild-type C86 strain. This can be attributed to the synergetic effect of the bonding reaction between fluconazole and AgNPs. Taken together, this first-ever interdisciplinary study strongly suggests that the CNP 41 gene could play a vital role in drug resistance in this fungal pathogen.