# Mechanisms of White-Opaque Switching in Candida albicans

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO · 2024 · $727,285

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract
Candida albicans is one of the most prevalent fungal pathogen of humans and also a component of
the human microbiome; it can cause superficial infections in normal humans and life-threatening
systemic infections in immune compromised individuals. Our work seeks to understand how C.
albicans regulates its genes so it can survive and proliferate in the many different environments of its
human host. This proposal focuses on a single, large transcription circuit—the white-opaque switching
circuit—which allows two different cell-types to be produced epigenetically from the same genome.
White-opaque switching is deeply conserved across clinical isolates of C. albicans and is also
observed in closely related Candida species. This proposal seeks to understand the mechanism
behind white-opaque switching, the mechanisms underlying the stability of the two distinct, epigenetic
cell-types and the effects of white-opaque switching on Candida’s ability to thrive in its mammalian
hosts.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10801768
- **Project number:** 1R01AI175080-01A1
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO
- **Principal Investigator:** ALEXANDER D JOHNSON
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $727,285
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2023-11-06 → 2028-10-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10801768

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10801768, Mechanisms of White-Opaque Switching in Candida albicans (1R01AI175080-01A1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10801768. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*