\textit does not work in a caption in bioinfo.cls

As described in this posting
https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/453542/unable-to-use-texit-in-caption

bioinfo.cls defines an invalid font:

\renewcommand{\sfdefault}{phb}

resulting in \textit not working in figure captions

xfun::session_info('rticles')

R version 4.2.0 Patched (2022-04-28 r82285)
Platform: x86_64-apple-darwin17.0 (64-bit)
Running under: macOS Big Sur/Monterey 10.16

Locale: en_US.UTF-8 / en_US.UTF-8 / en_US.UTF-8 / C / en_US.UTF-8 / en_US.UTF-8

Package version:
  base64enc_0.1.3   bslib_0.4.2       cachem_1.0.8      cli_3.6.1        
  digest_0.6.31     ellipsis_0.3.2    evaluate_0.21     fastmap_1.1.1    
  fontawesome_0.5.1 fs_1.6.2          glue_1.6.2        graphics_4.2.0   
  grDevices_4.2.0   highr_0.10        htmltools_0.5.5   jquerylib_0.1.4  
  jsonlite_1.8.5    knitr_1.43        lifecycle_1.0.3   magrittr_2.0.3   
  memoise_2.0.1     methods_4.2.0     mime_0.12         R6_2.5.1         
  rappdirs_0.3.3    rlang_1.1.1       rmarkdown_2.22    rticles_0.25     
  sass_0.4.6        stats_4.2.0       stringi_1.7.12    stringr_1.5.0    
  tinytex_0.45      tools_4.2.0       utils_4.2.0       vctrs_0.6.2      
  xfun_0.39         yaml_2.3.7       

bioinfo-cap-it.Rmd.gz

Start with bioinfo.cls and inspect its \renewcommand{\sfdefault}{phb} definition. Reproduce the problem using the attached bioinfo-cap-it.Rmd.gz, then render the figure caption and confirm that \textit produces italic text without font errors.