-Clinical manifestations: highly variable, ranging from sarophytic airway colonization without clinical evidence of disease to full-blown acute respiratory distress syndrome in compromised hosts. Cryptococcal infection can deveop in both immunocompetent and immunocompromised hosts, but it may result in severe, disseminated disease in immunocompromised patients. 

-Radiologic findings: Pulmonary cryptococcosis may manifest as a solitary lung mass, as multiple nodules, as a segmental or lobar consolidation, or rarely as an interstitial pneumonia. Cavitation, effusion, and adenopathy are more frequently seen in immunocompromised hosts than in immumocompetent hosts.

-Diagnosis: Definitive diagnosis depends on demonstrating characteristic yeat-like organism with its surrounding capsule in tissue or fluid obtained from involved sites, together with cultural confirmation.