The yeast Candida glabrata is an opportunistic human fungal pathogen whose incidence has increased in the last two decades. Despite its name, this yeast is only distantly related to the model fungal pathogen C. albicans, and more closely related to Saccharomyces cerevisiae and other yeasts that underwent an ancient whole-genome duplication. Understanding what specific traits make C. glabrata a successful opportunistic pathogen within a clade of mostly innocuous yeasts, and how these compare to virulence traits in distant pathogens such as C. albicans is a focus of intense research. From an evolutionary perspective, uncovering how the ability to infect humans has emerged multiple, independent times in different lineages may reveal new disease mechanisms and provide us with the capacity to predict which genomic features in a clade may confer a higher potential to develop virulence against humans.

TG group acknowledges support of the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness grants, ‘Centro de Excelencia Severo Ochoa 2013–2017’ SEV-2012-0208, and BIO2012-37161 cofounded by European Regional Development Fund (ERDF); from the European Union and ERC Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreements FP7-PEOPLE-2013-ITN-606786 and ERC-2012-StG-310325, and grant from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No H2020-MSCA-ITN-2014-642095.