A cosmopolitan fungal pathogen of dicots adopts an endophytic lifestyle on cereal crops and protects them from major fungal diseases

Fungal pathogens are seriously threatening food security and natural ecosystems; efficient and environmentally friendly control methods are essential to help safeguard such resources for increasing human populations on a global scale. Here, we find that Sclerotinia sclerotiorum , a widespread pathog...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The ISME Journal Vol. 14; no. 12; pp. 3120 - 3135
Main Authors: Tian, Binnian, Xie, Jiatao, Fu, Yanping, Cheng, Jiasen, Li, Bo, Chen, Tao, Zhao, Ying, Gao, Zhixiao, Yang, Puyun, Barbetti, Martin J., Tyler, Brett M., Jiang, Daohong
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 01.12.2020
Oxford University Press
Subjects:
14/1
14/19
14/28
14/35
14/63
38/39
38/77
38/91
631/158/855
631/326/193/2539
82/1
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Ascomycota
Biological control
Biomedical and Life Sciences
Blight
Cereal crops
Control methods
Crop yield
Disease resistance
Ecology
Ecosystem
Edible Grain
Endophytes
Evolutionary Biology
Food security
Fungal diseases
Fungi
Fusarium
Gene expression
Human populations
Humans
Life Sciences
Life Style
Magnoliopsida
Microbial Ecology
Microbial Genetics and Genomics
Microbiology
Microorganisms
Mycoses
Pathogens
Photosynthesis
Plant Diseases
Probiotics
Rice
Rice blast
Stripe rust
Wheat
ISSN:1751-7362, 1751-7370, 1751-7370
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Fungal pathogens are seriously threatening food security and natural ecosystems; efficient and environmentally friendly control methods are essential to help safeguard such resources for increasing human populations on a global scale. Here, we find that Sclerotinia sclerotiorum , a widespread pathogen of dicotyledons, can grow endophytically in wheat, rice, barley, maize, and oat, providing protection against Fusarium head blight, stripe rust, and rice blast. Protection is also provided by disabled S. sclerotiorum strains harboring a hypovirulence virus. The disabled strain DT-8 promoted wheat yields by 4–18% in the field and consistently reduced Fusarium disease by 40–60% across multiple field trials. We term the host-dependent trophism of S. sclerotiorum , destructively pathogenic or mutualistically endophytic, as schizotrophism. As a biotroph, S. sclerotiorum modified the expression of wheat genes involved in disease resistance and photosynthesis and increased the level of IAA. Our study shows that a broad-spectrum pathogen of one group of plants may be employed as a biocontrol agent in a different group of plants where they can be utilized as beneficial microorganisms while avoiding the risk of in-field release of pathogens. Our study also raises provocative questions about the potential role of schizotrophic endophytes in natural ecosystems.
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ISSN:1751-7362
1751-7370
1751-7370
DOI:10.1038/s41396-020-00744-6