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“Feast-Fit-Fist-Feat”: Overview of Free-living Amoeba Interactions with Fungi and Virulence as a Foundation for Success in Battle

  • Tropical Mycoses (L Martinez, Section Editor)
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Abstract

Purpose of Review

Free-living amoebae (FLAs) are ubiquitous and can co-habit similar niches and interact with fungi. Herein, we discuss theories on FLAs and the origin, evolution, and conservation of fungal virulence, proposing the “feast-fit-fist-feat” hypothesis that covers the knowledge on FLA-fungi interactions, and could be extended during evolutionarily host escalation. Overall, by bridling this selective pressure, fungi might return to environment and by serendipity, infect superior hosts. The selected traits might grant the fungus with an enhanced capacity to cause damage, or virulence. The fungal virulence factors that might be expressed during infection to amoeba and that grant a fungal benefit during infection to mammals are discussed. However, how they are induced during infection of FLAs is still an open field. Here we discuss also the “Trojan Horse” role of FLAs and the importance of co-infections and disease outcome.

Recent Findings

Herein, we discuss also at the molecular level the early steps on how FLAs are able to attach and internalize fungal pathogens. Upon entrance, amoeba interaction might pose selective pressures, and the result is usually a more virulent phenotype of the fungus. Amoeba is able to modulate several fungal virulence factors, most of them with relative importance for infection to superior or more evolved hosts. This interaction fungi-FLAs makes an attractive model for the application of the “One Health” concept in order to avoid new emerging more virulent fungal species.

Summary

Amoeba-fungi interactions are still an open field, with several avenues yet to be explored, which might explain the origin of microbial virulence and innate immunity evolution. Several mechanisms of direct or indirect regulation might be involved.

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  1. Laboratório de Bioquímica e Imunologia das Micoses, Departamento de Microbiologia e Parasitologia, Instituto Biomédico, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Niterói, RJ, Brazil

    Marina da Silva Ferreira & Allan J. Guimarães

  2. Pós-Graduação em Imunologia e Inflamação, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil

    Marina da Silva Ferreira & Allan J. Guimarães

  3. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Microbiologia e Parasitologia Aplicadas, Instituto Biomédico, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Niterói, RJ, Brazil

    Diego de Souza Gonçalves & Allan J. Guimarães

  4. Pós-Graduação em Doenças Infecciosas e Parasitárias, Faculdade de Medicina, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil

    Diego de Souza Gonçalves & Elisa Gonçalves Medeiros

  5. Departamento de Imunologia, Instituto de Microbiologia Paulo de Góes, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil

    Elisa Gonçalves Medeiros & José Mauro Peralta

  6. Instituto Biomédico, Dept. de Microbiologia e Parasitologia – MIP, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Rua Prof. Hernani Pires de Melo 101, São Domingos, Niterói, RJ, Brazil

    Allan J. Guimarães

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da Silva Ferreira, M., de Souza Gonçalves, D., Medeiros, E.G. et al. “Feast-Fit-Fist-Feat”: Overview of Free-living Amoeba Interactions with Fungi and Virulence as a Foundation for Success in Battle. Curr Trop Med Rep 8, 18–31 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40475-020-00220-3

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