Transcriptional profiling of CAI4 (Wild-type), cpp1?/?, cek1?/?, cek2?/?, cpp1?/? cek1?/?, cpp1?/? cek2?/? and cek1?/? cek2?/? strains in the absence or presence of alpha pheromone in Candida albicans

Twenty-one pheromone-induced genes were selected from the literature (Zhao, Daniels et al. 2005 was the major source) as the reference set for assessing the pheromone response of CAI4 (Wild-type), cpp1?/?, cek1?/?, cek2?/?, cpp1?/? cek1?/?, cpp1?/? cek2?/? and cek1?/? cek2?/? strains.Our aim was to check whether or not these 21 pheromone-induced genes are up-regulated in response to pheromone in each mutant strain. Overall design: Total RNA was extracted from CAI4, cpp1?/?, cek1?/?, cek2?/?, cpp1?/? cek1?/?, cpp1?/? cek2?/? and cek1?/? cek2?/? strains. Cultures were grown overnight in SC- Glucose media at room temperature and were diluted to OD600 of 0.1 in 10 ml the next day. for each strain 2 sets of samples were prepared, one set were treated with a-pheromone (1µg/ml) and the other was untreated. After 3 hours of treatment cells were collected at an OD600 of between 0.8 and 1.