Comparative Genomics and Virulence in the pathogenic fungus Paracoccidioides brasiliensis. Blastomyces silverae strain:UAMH 139

Paracoccidioidomycosis is a systemic disease caused by the dimorphic fungus Paracoccidioides brasiliensis. It is restricted to Latin America where it can reach a prevalence of up to 10% and the population at risk is estimated at about 90 million people. The recent availability of annotated genome assemblies of several strains from three related human pathogenic genera, Paracoccidioides, Histoplasma and Blastomyces, complemented by additional NGS assembly and annotation of previously unsequenced, closely related fungi that are not pathogenic for humans, should allow the harnessing of comparative genomics methods in order to identify likely virulence factors that make this fungus pathogenic, i.e., support or rebut candidate pathogenicity/virulence genes and pathways as well as propose new ones. Two closely related species are Emmonsia parva and Emmonsia crescens, which can cause pulmonary disease in rodents (adiaspiromycosis) but only very rarely in humans. The sequencing, assembly, annotation and comparative analysis of E. parva and E. crescens, together with the previously annotated assemblies of strains of the three related human pathogenic fungi P. brasiliensis, H. capsulatum and B. dermatitidis, should allow better identification of likely pathogenicity/virulence factors in these Onygenales fungi. Such comparative approaches could be used as a lead for the design of vaccines, drugs and diagnostic methods.