Surveillance of Azole Resistance Among Candida spp. as a Strategy for the Indirect Monitoring of Freshwater Environments

The growing pollution mainly caused by the discharge of industrial, sanitary, and agricultural wastes has become one of the main current environmental issues. Thus, the use of bioindicators has become an important tool for investigating environmental imbalance. In this context, microorganisms have shown to be important for the identification of altered environments because of their ubiquity and their ability to grow in inhospitable habitats. Yeasts of the genus Candida are potential bioindicators because of their ability to survive in contaminated freshwater environments. Besides, they are more frequently recovered than fecal coliforms. It is noteworthy that the nonspecific activity of efflux pumps, which help in cellular detoxification processes, may be associated with the presence of chemical compounds in contaminated environments. Thus, the activity of efflux pumps may be the main mechanism involved in the resistance to azole derivatives in Candida spp. and the assessment of their activity may also be a tool for environmental monitoring. As a result, the phenotypical and molecular evaluation of this antifungal resistance in Candida species has been pointed as a promising tool for monitoring the quality of aquatic environments. Hence, the objective of this study was to collect and systematize data pointing to an alternative use of Candida spp. as bioindicators by assessing the occurrence of azole resistance among environmental Candida as a strategy to monitor the quality of freshwater environments.