1. Mucorsp.-An endophyte of Brassicaceae capable of surviving in toxic metal-rich sites
- Author
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Agnieszka Domka, Katarzyna Turnau, Rafał Ważny, and Piotr Rozpądek
- Subjects
Arabidopsis ,Plant Development ,Fungus ,Plant Roots ,Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology ,Endophyte ,Plant use of endophytic fungi in defense ,Arabidopsis arenosa ,Soil ,03 medical and health sciences ,Metals, Heavy ,Botany ,Endophytes ,Soil Pollutants ,030304 developmental biology ,Mucor ,0303 health sciences ,biology ,030306 microbiology ,Host (biology) ,fungi ,food and beverages ,Brassicaceae ,General Medicine ,Catalase ,biology.organism_classification ,Oxidative Stress ,Zinc ,Biodegradation, Environmental ,Lead ,Metals ,Shoot ,Plant Shoots ,Cadmium - Abstract
The aim of this study was to assess the biodiversity of endophytic fungi from Arabidopsis arenosa growing on a post mining waste dump and to evaluate their role in plant adaptation to metal toxicity. Severeal of the fungi were beneficial for the plant. Among them, a fungus belonging to the Mucor genus, was found to interact with a broad range of plants, including Brassicaceae metallophytes. Mucor sp. was shown to be highly tolerant to elevated levels of Zn, Cd, and Pb and to accelerate plant-host growth under either toxic-metal stress or control conditions. When inoculated with Mucor sp., A. arenosa under toxic-metal stress acquired more N and showed significantly down-regulated catalase activity, which suggests suppression of toxic-metal-induced oxidative stress. We used the model plant-A. thaliana to evaluate the dynamics of plant-tissue colonization by the fungus as monitored with qPCR and to analyze the host's transcriptome response during early stages of the interaction. The results revealed the induction of a plant-defense and stress-related response on the 5th day of co-culture, which was in accord with the decrease of fungal abundance in shoots on the 6th day of interaction. Presented results demonstrate the importance of endophytic fungi in plant toxic-metal tolerance.
- Published
- 2018
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