The role of Dnj4 in the transcriptional response to hydroxyurea induced DNA damage in Cryptococcus neoformans

We characterized the impact of the J domain co-chaperone, Dnj4, on the transcriptional response to DNA damage induced by hydroxyurea (an inhibitor of ribonucleotide reductase) in Cryptococcus neoformans. We treated wild type (WT) and mutant dnj4∆ log phase cells with hydroxyurea for one hour and found that the loss of DNJ4 impaired the transcriptional response to HU. In particular, the up-regulation of DNA damage and repair genes as well as iron uptake genes was impaired in these mutants. This study provides the first dataset on the transcriptional response to hydroxyurea in C. neoformans as a resource to the fungal pathogen community. Wild type and mutant (dnj4∆) strains with untreated controls and hydroxyurea treated samples (WT, WTHU, Dnj4, Dnj4HU). For each group 3 replicates were sequenced.