Candida albicans

Christine Berkhou, a Dutch Mycologist, created the Genus Candida.  Candida albicans [Synnomys Oidium albicans (Robin) Zopft, Monilia albicans (Robin) Zopf, Monilia pinyoi (Castellani)] is an opportunitic fungus and the  disease caused by C.albicans is called Candidiasis or Moniliasis. The Candida  species are the forth most common organisms causing blood stream infection,  and constitutes 8% of all nosocomial infections (Shivaprakash et al., 2007). The  genus Candida comprises about 200 species. C.albicans, C. tropicalis, V. galbarta,  C. auris, C. kruseii C. lusitaniae and C.viswanathiiare and C. krusei are medically  important species. There are other species of Candida e.g., C. tropicalis, C.  parapsilosis, C. viswnnathii and other species. C. albicans, is a commensal  organism in the microflora of the oral cavity, the gastrointestinal and urogenital  tracts (Calderone, 2002). Candidiasis caused by Candida species may be acute,  or chronic, superficial or disseminated fungal infection. Candida affects more  immunocompromised hosts due to their weak immuniy. Candidiasis of mouth  and throat is called thrush. An emerging multidrug resistant C. auris causes serious disease. C. auris has been found resistant to all three antifungal drugs.  C. auris infection is an emerging global threat since its first identification in  Japan in 2009 (Satoh et al., 2009). The emergence of C. auris in India was noted  in sporadic outbreaks and in a multicentre study of candidemia across 27 ICUs  in 2011 (Chowdhary et al., 2013, 2014, Rudramurthy et al., 2017). The fungus  was the causative agent in 5.3% (74/1400) of these episodes, ranking fifth of the  agents causing candidemia.