The phenothiaziniums are known to localise in the plasma membrane

of yeast.[29] Consequently, this is the cellular structure primarily damaged upon illumination and it has been proposed that the increased permeability resulting from such damage is the reason for cell death.[29] The fungicidal effect of MB has been demonstrated on various species of the Candida genus (C. albicans, C. dubliniensis, C. krusei and C. tropicalis) [30] and that of NMB on C. albicans, both in vitro and in an in vivo mouse model with infected abrasion wounds.[11] The concentration of DMMB needed to photoinactivate C. albicans (2.5–5 μmol l−1) was much lower than that for NMB (20 μmol l−1), which in turn was significantly lower than S1P Receptor inhibitor that for toluidine blue O or MB.[11] Nevertheless, our results are not completely comparable because their fluence was lower (9.75 J cm−2) than the one used in our experiments (18 and 37 J cm−2). The ROS-quenchers study revealed a different pattern of ROS contributing to the fungicidal effect of HYP and DMMB PDT. Previous studies have shown that hydrogen peroxide may be the most important ROS involved in the photoinactivation of C. albicans by HYP[31] and this agrees with the findings of this study. The involvement of hydrogen peroxide in the PDT-mediated

fungal killing could be confirmed by studies that examined the killing of Candida cells by addition of concentrations of H2O2 similar to those likely to be generated during PDT. Hydrogen peroxide generation has been reported within an hour of HYP photosensitisation followed by glutation depletion.[32] A signalling role of hydrogen CH5424802 supplier peroxide in C. albicans has been firmly established, in fact higher concentrations of hydrogen peroxide can induce programmed cell death.[33] Likewise, Price et al. [34] have demonstrated that hydrogen peroxide is a very important factor in the pro-apoptotic response to PDT, being determinant in the photokilling process. In contrast, our results point to singlet oxygen as the PJ34 HCl main cytotoxic species for DMMB, in agreement with the results found for the photobactericidal activity of the phenothiaziniums.[16]

Finally, we were unable to find significant differences in the ROS pattern among azole-resistant and susceptible C. albicans strains. This study demonstrates that aPDT is effective in eliminating in vitro C. albicans strains independent of their azole resistance pattern, even using PSs with different mechanisms of action, such as HYP and DMMB. However, there are subtle differences between them: HYP is more efficient at low yeast density whereas DMMB performs better at high density; HYP has less dark cytotoxicity than DMMB and its effect is less dependent on the type of C. albicans strain. This study was supported by grant no. PI1120/09 and Research Groups B65 and B85 from the Department of Science, Technology and University of the Government of Aragón.