Cryptococcus laurentii Fungemia

Cryptococcus laurentii fungemia in a premature neonate.

Cryptococcus spp. other than Cryptococcus neoformans are generally considered nonpathogenic to humans. There are only 15 case reports of disease in humans caused by Cryptococcus laurentii infection. Underlying diseases and predisposing risk factors seem to play an important role in these cases. Our patient is the first case of an extremely low birth weight infant with C. laurentii fungemia repo...

Fungemia in a cancer patient caused by fluconazole-resistant Cryptococcus laurentii.

We report the recent isolation of Cryptococcus laurentii from the blood of a patient given the diagnosis of ganglioneuroblastoma. The organism was identified using physiological and molecular characteristics, including morphology, carbohydrate and nitrate assimilation, urease activity, inability to form melanin on appropriate media, positive staining with diazonium blue B and sequence analysis ...

Xylosyltransferases in Cryptococcus laurentii.

Heteroglycan synthesis in Cryptococcus laurentii.

An enzyme preparation from Cryptococcus laurentii catalyzes the transfer of glycosyl units from sugar nucleotides to exogenous acceptor resulting in the stepwise synthesis of a heteroglycan with the following structure: Z-O-a-n-mannosyl6-O-oc-D-mannosyl-3-~-~-D-mannosyl-(2 -0 -0 -D -xylosyl-) D-mannose. The same enzyme preparation transfers D-[‘T]mannosyl from GDP [WJmannose to an endogenous gl...

Mannosyl transfer in Cryptococcus laurentii.

A particle-bound enzyme from the fungus imperfectus Cryfitococcus taurentii var. flavescens (NRRL Y-1401) mediates transfer of mannosyl units from GDP-mannose to endogenous primer. The enzyme requires divalent cations for activity. The pH optimum is ‘7.5 and the apparent K, for GDP-mannose is 0.14 mbr. A polysaccharide fraction that is associated with the enzyme was found to be similar to a pol...