FIGURE 2.

Role of Pho4 in virulence. (A) Survival curve of Galleria mellonella larvae. 10⁶ Candida albicans cells were injected at the last left pro-leg of G. mellonella larvae and survival of the insect was followed in time. Control means G. mellonella larvae no inoculated and control PBS indicates larvae inoculated with PBS as stress control. Kaplan–Meier survival curves are shown. Log-rank (Mantel–Cox) test displayed no significant differences between wild type and pho4 mutant (p-value 0.2758). (B) Relative viability of C. albicans strains in the presence of murine macrophage cell line (RAW 264.7) or peritoneal extracted murine macrophages (Peritoneal MΦ). The percentage of viability was quantified after 2 h of co-incubation at a cell ratio 1:40. The graph shows six independent experiments. The Error bar is the standard error of the mean (SEM). Statistical differences among two groups were calculated using Student’s two-tailed unpaired t-test ^∗p < 0.05 (p < 0.0444 for RAW264.7 and p < 0.3457 for peritoneal macrophages).