Abstract

Pigment production by Cryptococcus neoformans from para- and ortho-Diphenols: effect of the nitrogen source. S Chaskes and R L Tyndall ABSTRACT Cryptococcus neoformans produced pigments when p-diphenols were substrates in a glucose-amino acid-salts medium. The best substrates were 2.5-dihydroxybenzoic acid and 2,5-dihydroxybenzenesulfonic acid. In contrast to the cellular pigment production from o-diphenols (hydroxyl groups in the 2,3- or 3,4-position of phenyl ring), the p-diphenols (1,4- or 2,5-positions for the hydroxyl groups) produced large amounts of soluble pigments that diffused into the medium. When an optimal source of nitrogen (glutamine, glycine, and asparagine) was used, 89% of the C. neoformans strains produced pigments from p-diphenols. In contrast, 0 to 67% of the strains produced pigments when a suboptimal nitrogen source (proline, ammonium sulfate, ornithine, and methionine) was used. When glutamine-glycine-asparagine was the nitrogen source, 100% of the C. neoformans strains produced pigments from o0diphenols, whereas 77 to 100% of the strains produced pigment when proline-ammonium sulfate-ornithine-methionine was the nitrogen source. Cryptococcus species other than C. neoformans and all tested Candida species failed to produce pigments from any of the substrates except when hydroquinone was used. A combination of glutamine-glycine-asparagine and 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine allowed differentiation of colonies of C. neoformans from C. albicans in 3 to 6 days. These data showed that pigment production from o- and p-diphenols served as an excellent biochemical test for the identification of C. neoformans. CiteULike Connotea Delicious Digg Facebook Google+ Mendeley Reddit StumbleUpon Twitter What's this? « Previous | Next Article » Table of Contents This Article J. Clin. Microbiol. June 1975 vol. 1 no. 6 509-514 » Abstract PDF Classifications Research Article Services Email this article to a colleague Similar articles in ASM journals Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of JCM Download to citation manager Reprints and Permissions Copyright Information Books from ASM Press MicrobeWorld Citing Articles Load citing article information Citing articles via Web of Science Citing articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Chaskes, S. Articles by Tyndall, R. L. Search for related content PubMed PubMed citation Articles by Chaskes, S. Articles by Tyndall, R. L. Related Content Load related web page information Social Bookmarking CiteULike Connotea Delicious Digg Facebook Google+ Mendeley Reddit StumbleUpon Twitter What's this? current issue December 2011, volume 49, issue 12 Alert me to new issues of JCM About JCM Subscribers Authors Reviewers Advertisers Inquiries from the Press Permissions & Commercial Reprints ASM Journals Public Access Policy JCM RSS Feeds 1752 N Street N.W. • Washington DC 20036 202.737.3600 • 202.942.9355 fax • journals@asmusa.org Print ISSN: 0095-1137 Online ISSN: 1098-660X Copyright © 2011 by the American Society for Microbiology. For an alternate route to JCM .asm.org, visit: http://intl- JCM .asm.org | More Info» var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-5821458-10"); pageTracker._trackPageview();