Comparison of biofilm formation and enzymatic activities of different clinical Candida species from different parts of Iran

Candidiasis is one of the serious opportunistic fungal infections caused by different species of Candida, especially Candida albicans. The extracellular enzymatic activities are determined as principal factors for pathogenesis of Candida spp., involved in the degradation of proteins and adhesion during biofilm formation. The study was performed on 100 Candida isolates prepared from patients with various forms of Candidiasis, referred to the Laboratory. All isolates were confirmed by phenotypic methods. The evaluation of enzyme activity of different of Candida spp. was done in chromogenic media. In addition, the biofilm formation of all isolates was done by MTT method. Our results indicated the proteinase activity was positive (mean 0.015), hemolysin activity was positive (mean= 0.027), phospholipase activity was positive (mean=0.52) and esterase activity was positive (mean=0.003). The highest and lowest biofilm formation were seen in in C. glabrata with (OD=0.62) and C. tropicalis with (OD=0.46), respectively. The secretion of several enzymes by Candida isolates has been identified for their virulence factors in Candidiasis. Our data recommend that biofilm formation is probably to key a role in the pathogenicity of Candidiasis, and in patients with immunocompromised, this might be due to the capability of C. albicans to adapt to the changed physiological environmental.