Biophysikalische Bildgebung

To become pathogenic and translocate across the intestinal epithelium C.abicans fungus needs to change its morphology from yeast to invasive filamentous. Fungal cytolytic peptide toxin, Candidalysin secreted during fungal invasion, is found to be crucial in direct cell membrane damage, the stimulation of a danger response signaling pathway, and the activation of epithelial immunity. Due to its amphiphilic alpha-helical structure peptide has a high binding affinity to plasma membranes. With increasing accumulation on the membrane surfaces, bilayer until the plasma membrane is damaged. Here, we used spectral imaging to assess the lipid packing changes in model membranes and plasma membranes of living epithelial cells under the treatment of candidalysin. Solvatochromic polarity-sensitive dye was used to label live oral and gut epithelial cells. Spectral imaging data allowed to calculate generalized polarization map of the labelled plasma membrane, and showed a significant change in membrane packing of Candidalysin treated epithelial cells.