Data from: Invasion of Solanum tuberosum L. by Aspergillus terreus: a microscopic and proteomics insight on pathogenicity

Background: Aspergillus terreus is one of the most harmful filamentous fungal pathogen of humans, animals and plants. Recently, researchers have discovered that A. terreus can cause foliar blight disease in potato (Solanum tuberosum L.). We used light and scanning electron microscopy, and performed proteomics analysis in an attempt to dissect the invasion process of A. terreus in this important crop. Results: Microscopic study revealed that invasion of leaf tissue is marked by rapid germination of A. terreus phialidic conidia (PC) by 4 h after inoculation. By 8 h after inoculation, primary germ tubes from PC differentiated into irregular protuberance, often displayed stomata atropism, and failed to penetrate via the epidermal cells. Colonization of leaf tissues was associated with high rate of production of accessory conidia (AC). These analyses showed the occurrence of a unique opposing pattern of AC, tissue-specific and produced on melanized colonizing hyphae during the infection of leaf tissue. A significant proteome change hallmarked by differential expression of class I patatin, lipoxygenase, catalase-peroxidase complex, and cysteine proteinase inhibitor were observed during tuber colonization. These proteins are often involved in signal transduction pathways and crosstalk in pathogenic responses. Conclusion: A. terreus abundantly produced AC and multipolar germinating PC to invade potato leaf tissue. Additionally, A. terreus differentially induced enzymes in potato tuber during colonization which facilitates rapid disease development

Host-Range Dynamics of Cochliobolus lunatus: From a Biocontrol Agent to a Severe Environmental Threat

We undertook an investigation to advance understanding of the host-range dynamics and biocontrol implications of Cochliobolus lunatus in the past decade. Potato (Solanum tuberosum L) farms were routinely surveyed for brown-to-black leaf spot disease caused by C. lunatus. A biphasic gene data set was assembled and databases were mined for reported hosts of C. lunatus in the last decade. The placement of five virulent strains of C. lunatus causing foliar necrosis of potato was studied with microscopic and phylogenetic tools. Analysis of morphology showed intraspecific variations in stromatic tissues among the virulent strains causing foliar necrosis of potato. A maximum likelihood inference based on GPDH locus separated C. lunatus strains into subclusters and revealed the emergence of unclustered strains. The evolving nutritional requirement of C. lunatus in the last decade is exhibited by the invasion of vertebrates, invertebrates, dicots, and monocots. Our results contribute towards a better understanding of the host-range dynamics of C. lunatus and provide useful implications on the threat posed to the environment when C. lunatus is used as a mycoherbicide

Host-Range Dynamics of Cochliobolus lunatus: From a Biocontrol Agent to a Severe Environmental Threat

We undertook an investigation to advance understanding of the host-range dynamics and biocontrol implications of Cochliobolus lunatus in the past decade. Potato (Solanum tuberosum L) farms were routinely surveyed for brown-to-black leaf spot disease caused by C. lunatus. A biphasic gene data set was assembled and databases were mined for reported hosts of C. lunatus in the last decade. The placement of five virulent strains of C. lunatus causing foliar necrosis of potato was studied with microscopic and phylogenetic tools. Analysis of morphology showed intraspecific variations in stromatic tissues among the virulent strains causing foliar necrosis of potato. A maximum likelihood inference based on GPDH locus separated C. lunatus strains into subclusters and revealed the emergence of unclustered strains. The evolving nutritional requirement of C. lunatus in the last decade is exhibited by the invasion of vertebrates, invertebrates, dicots, and monocots. Our results contribute towards a better understanding of the host-range dynamics of C. lunatus and provide useful implications on the threat posed to the environment when C. lunatus is used as a mycoherbicide

Figure 1-Phylogenetic and morpgological placement of Aspergillus terreus

Figure 1 Molecular phylogenetic analysis by Maximum likelihood method (ML) based on the K2 + G substitution model. AIC is 1953.78, BIC is 2311.02; the highest log likelihood is -953.45 and bootstrap values ≥ 50% from 1000 iterations are shown. Blue highlighted strain of A. terreus (GenBank® accession number KC305600) causes foliar necrosis of potato. The ML analysis was performed in MEGA 6 [34]. Morphological characteristics of globular accessory conidia indicated arrows stained with Rose Bengal, broom-like conidiophore and colony on PDA, scale bar = 20 µm and magnification = 1000X

File 1-Muscle-aligned cadmodulin genes of Aspergillus terreus

Multiple sequence alignment of partial sequences of Cadmodulin gene of Aspergillus terreus. The sequences were aligned using Muscle software in MEGA 6.01 using default settings