Candida albicans is a ubiquitous mucosal commensal that is normally prevented from causing acute or chronic invasive disease. Neutrophils contribute to protection in oral infection but exacerbate vulvovaginal candidiasis. To dissect the role of neutrophils during mucosal candidiasis, we took advantage of a new, transparent zebrafish swim bladder infection model. Intravital microscopic tracking of individual animals revealed that the blocking of neutrophil recruitment leads to rapid mortality in this model through faster disease progression. Conversely, artificial recruitment of neutrophils during early infection reduces disease pressure. Noninvasive longitudinal tracking showed that mortality is a consequence of C. albicans breaching the epithelial barrier and invading surrounding tissues. Accordingly, we found that a hyperfilamentous C. albicans strain breaches the epithelial barrier more frequently and causes mortality in immunocompetent zebrafish. A lack of neutrophils at the infection site is associated with less fungusassociated extracellular DNA and less damage to fungal filaments, suggesting that neutrophil extracellular traps help to protect the epithelial barrier from C. albicans breach. We propose a homeostatic model where C. albicans disease pressure is balanced by neutrophil-mediated damage of fungi, maintaining this organism as a commensal while minimizing the risk of damage to host tissue. The unequaled ability to dissect infection dynamics at a high spatiotemporal resolution makes this zebrafish model a unique tool for understanding mucosal host-pathogen interactions.KEYWORDS Candida albicans, mucosal immunity, neutrophils, zebrafish C andida albicans is the most successful commensal fungus at causing opportunistic mucosal and invasive infections (1, 2). The opportunistic nature of C. albicans mucosal infection suggests that there is a constantly challenged impasse between our immune defenses and C. albicans virulence factors (3, 4). Chronic mucocutaneous candidiasis (CMC) is associated with inborn errors of adaptive immune pathways, especially Th17 immunity (5). However, acute oropharyngeal candidiasis (OPC) is more common in neutropenic patients and can result from a multitude of immunesuppressive treatments that affect both innate and adaptive immunity, such as radiation/chemotherapy and corticosteroid or antibiotic use (6, 7).Experimental work in murine models of OPC suggests that C. albicans is kept at bay in mucosal tissues through the action of epithelial cells, neutrophils, and macrophages (8). To protect from mucosal invasion in OPC, neutrophils must be present in the blood, be recruited to the site of infection, and possess a fully functional antimicrobial arsenal (9-12). Neutrophils attack both the yeast and filamentous forms of C. albicans and are associated with vulvovaginal candidiasis (13-15). Counterintuitively, because symptomatic infection is more closely associated with high neutrophil numbers than with the fungal burden, it is believed that neutrophils do more to cause...