Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94158, USA.
Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94158, USA.
Trends Microbiol. 2024 May;32(5):435-447. doi: 10.1016/j.tim.2023.10.011. Epub 2023 Nov 18.
Invasive fungal infections pose a major threat to human health. Bacterial and protozoan pathogens secrete protein effectors that overcome innate immune barriers to promote microbial colonization, yet few such molecules have been identified in human fungal pathogens. Recent studies have begun to reveal these long-sought effectors and have illuminated how they subvert key cellular pathways, including apoptosis, myeloid cell polarization, Toll-like receptor signaling, and phagosome action. Thus, despite lacking the specialized secretion systems of bacteria and parasites, it is increasingly clear that fungi independently evolved effectors targeting pathways often subverted by other classes of pathogens. These findings demonstrate the remarkable power of convergent evolution to enable diverse microbes to infect humans while also setting the stage for detailed dissection of fungal disease mechanisms.
侵袭性真菌感染对人类健康构成重大威胁。细菌和原生动物病原体分泌蛋白效应子，克服先天免疫屏障，促进微生物定植，但在人类真菌病原体中很少发现此类分子。最近的研究开始揭示这些长期以来被寻求的效应子，并阐明它们如何颠覆关键的细胞途径，包括细胞凋亡、髓样细胞极化、Toll 样受体信号和吞噬体作用。因此，尽管缺乏细菌和寄生虫的专门分泌系统，但越来越明显的是，真菌独立进化出针对途径的效应子，而这些途径通常被其他病原体类群颠覆。这些发现表明趋同进化的强大力量能够使不同的微生物感染人类，同时也为详细剖析真菌病机制奠定了基础。
