Allergens of Candida albicans and other clinically important fungi

Arzumanyan V.G., Shmelyova O.A., Sergeev A. Yu.

I.I. Mechnikov Research institute of vaccines and sera, Moscow
I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University

The article reviews the spectrum of allergic disease associated with seven genera of clinically important fungi: Candida, Malassezia, Saccharomyces, Cryptococcus, Trichosporon, Geotrichum and Rhodotorula. Listed are all possible human intake sources of fungi from that genera, along with certain clinical features of fungal allergy. Data on chemical structure, extraction and storage of major yeast allergens is presented. The presense of crossreacting epitopes of yeasts and its value for diagnosis of fungal allergy are discussed.