Disruption analysis of metallothionein-encoding genes in Candida glabrata

Abstract

Candida glabrata harbors multiple genes encoding metallothionein (MT). We have disrupted MT-IIa, an amplified locus, and MT-IIb, a single-copy gene, to determine the roles of various MT genes in CuSO4 resistance in C. glabrata. The concentration of CuSO4 required to inhibit the growth by 50% (IC50) of a C. glabrata strain harboring an amplified MT-IIa locus and a single-copy MT-IIb and MT-I genes was 7 mM in a synthetic complete medium. The IC50 decreased to approx. 1 mM when the amplified MT-IIa locus was deleted. The disruption of the MT-IIb gene decreased the IC50 further to 0.1 mM. The CuSO4 resistance in a strain lacking both of the MT-II genes was attributable to MT-I; no evidence was found for the production of (gamma EC)nG isopeptides. The comparison of the nucleotide sequence of MT-IIb to that of MT-IIa revealed the same coding sequence with differences in the 5' region. However, substantial differences were found in the 3' region. MT-IIb was expressed since we were able to purify the protein from the strain that had an intact MT-IIb gene, but a deleted MT-IIa gene. In addition, CuSO4 resistance was provided by MT-IIb. Northern analysis of the total RNA from varied C. glabrata strains indicated no significant changes in the expression of MT-I in the presence or absence of the MT-II genes.