Ima Fungus最新文献

The fungal genus Entomophthora consists of highly host-specific pathogens that cause deadly epizootics in their various insect hosts. The most well-known among these is the "zombie fly" fungus E. muscae, which, like other Entomophthora species, elicits a series of dramatic behaviors in infected hosts to promote optimal spore dispersal. Despite having been first described more than 160 years ago, there are still many open questions about Entomophthora biology, including the molecular underpinnings of host behavior manipulation and host specificity. This review provides a comprehensive overview of our current understanding of the biology of Entomophthora fungi and enumerates the most pressing outstanding questions that should be addressed in the field. We briefly review the discovery of Entomophthora and provide a summary of the 21 recognized Entomophthora species, including their type hosts, methods of transmission (ejection of spores after or before host death), and for which molecular data are available. Further, we argue that this genus is globally distributed, based on a compilation of Entomophthora records in the literature and in online naturalist databases, and likely to contain additional species. Evidence for strain-level specificity of hosts is summarized and directly compared to phylogenies of Entomophthora and the class Insecta. A detailed description of Entomophthora's life-cycle and observed manipulated behaviors is provided and used to summarize a consensus for ideal growth conditions. We discuss evidence for Entomophthora's adaptation to growth exclusively inside insects, such as producing wall-less hyphal bodies and a unique set of subtilisin-like proteases to penetrate the insect cuticle. However, we are only starting to understand the functions of unusual molecular and genomic characteristics, such as having large > 1 Gb genomes full of repetitive elements and potential functional diploidy. We argue that the high host-specificity and obligate life-style of most Entomophthora species provides ample scope for having been shaped by close coevolution with insects despite the current general lack of such evidence. Finally, we propose six major directions for future Entomophthora research and in doing so hope to provide a foundation for future studies of these fungi and their interaction with insects.

Fungal-fungal interaction often leads to the change in metabolite profile of both the interacting fungus which may have potential implication in industry or agriculture. In the present study, we performed two sets of fungal-fungal interaction-Trametes coccinea (F3) with Leiotrametes lactinea (F9) and T. coccinea (F3) with T. versicolor (F1) to understand the changes in the metabolite profile during the interaction process and how this process impacts the hyphal/mycelial morphology of the participating fungi. The metabolites produced during interaction of T. coccinea (F3) with L. lactinea (F9) and T. coccinea (F3) with T. versicolor (F1) was analysed through liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectroscopy (LC-MS). Most of the metabolites secreted or produced during interaction are associated with defensive response. Further, visualization with scanning electron microscopy revealed that interaction between the tested fungi led to the changes in the hyphal morphology. The bipartite fungal interaction resulted in the production of a dark brown colour pigment-melanin as confirmed by the LC-MS, FTIR and NMR analysis. Moreover, the fungal-fungal interaction also led to increase in the production of laccase, a group of multicopper oxidases involved in detoxification of toxic compounds. Further, increased activity of superoxide dismutase, an enzyme that catalyzes the dismutation of the superoxide anion to hydrogen peroxide was also recorded during fungal-fungal interaction. Quantitative real-time PCR revealed upregulation of lcc1 (encoding a laccase enzyme) and few other stress related genes of T. versicolor during its hyphal interaction with T. coccinea, suggesting a direct correlation between laccase production and melanin production.

Background: The genome sequence data of more than 65985 species are publicly available as of October 2021 within the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) database alone and additional genome sequences are available in other databases and also continue to accumulate at a rapid pace. However, an error-free functional annotation of these genome is essential for the research communities to fully utilize these data in an optimum and efficient manner.

Results: An analysis of proteome sequence data of 689 fungal species (7.15 million protein sequences) was conducted to identify the presence of functional annotation errors. Proteins associated with calcium signaling events, including calcium dependent protein kinases (CDPKs), calmodulins (CaM), calmodulin-like (CML) proteins, WRKY transcription factors, selenoproteins, and proteins associated with the terpene biosynthesis pathway, were targeted in the analysis. Gene associated with CDPKs and selenoproteins are known to be absent in fungal genomes. Our analysis, however, revealed the presence of proteins that were functionally annotated as CDPK proteins. However, InterproScan analysis indicated that none of the protein sequences annotated as "calcium dependent protein kinase" were found to encode calcium binding EF-hands at the regulatory domain. Similarly, none of a protein sequences annotated as a "selenocysteine" were found to contain a Sec (U) amino acid. Proteins annotated as CaM and CMLs also had significant discrepancies. CaM proteins should contain four calcium binding EF-hands, however, a range of 2-4 calcium binding EF-hands were present in the fungal proteins that were annotated as CaM proteins. Similarly, CMLs should possess four calcium binding EF-hands, but some of the CML annotated fungal proteins possessed either three or four calcium binding EF-hands. WRKY transcription factors are characterized by the presence of a WRKY domain and are confined to the plant kingdom. Several fungal proteins, however, were annotated as WRKY transcription factors, even though they did not contain a WRKY domain.

Conclusion: The presence of functional annotation errors in fungal genome and proteome databases is of considerable concern and needs to be addressed in a timely manner.

In this study, the complete mitochondrial genome of O. gracilis was sequenced and assembled before being compared with related species. As the second largest mitogenome reported in the family Ophiocordycipitaceae, the mitogenome of O. gracilis (voucher OG201301) is a circular DNA molecule of 134,288 bp that contains numerous introns and longer intergenomic regions. UCA was detected as anticodon in tRNA-Sec of O. gracilis, while comparative mitogenome analysis of nine Ophiocordycipitaceae fungi indicated that the order and contents of PCGs and rRNA genes were considerably conserved and could descend from a common ancestor in Ophiocordycipitaceae. In addition, the expansion of mitochondrial organization, introns, gene length, and order of O. gracilis were determined to be similar to those of O. sinensis, which indicated common mechanisms underlying adaptive evolution in O. gracilis and O. sinensis. Based on the mitochondrial gene dataset (15 PCGs and 2 RNA genes), a close genetic relationship between O. gracilis and O. sinensis was revealed through phylogenetic analysis. This study is the first to investigate the molecular evolution, phylogenetic pattern, and genetic structure characteristics of mitogenome in O. gracilis. Based on the obtained results, the mitogenome of O. gracilis can increase understanding of the genetic diversity and evolution of cordycipitoid fungi.

The relationship between entomopathogenic fungi and their insect hosts is a classic example of the co-evolutionary arms race between pathogen and target host. The present review describes the entomopathogenic potential of Chytridiomycota and Blastocladiomycota fungi, and two groups of fungal allies: Oomycota and Microsporidia. The Oomycota (water moulds) are considered as a model biological control agent of mosquito larvae. Due to their shared ecological and morphological similarities, they had long been considered a part of the fungal kingdom; however, phylogenetic studies have since placed this group within the Straminipila. The Microsporidia are parasites of economically-important insects, including grasshoppers, lady beetles, bumblebees, colorado potato beetles and honeybees. They have been found to display some fungal characteristics, and phylogenetic studies suggest that they are related to fungi, either as a basal branch or sister group. The Blastocladiomycota and Chytridiomycota, named the lower fungi, historically were described together; however, molecular phylogenetic and ultrastructural research has classified them in their own phylum. They are considered parasites of ants, and of the larval stages of black flies, mosquitoes and scale insects.

Recent progress in the discovery of fungal diversity has been enabled by intensive mycological surveys in centres of global biodiversity. Descriptions of new fungal species have been almost routinely based on phenotypic studies coupled with single or multigene phylogenetic analyses of DNA sequence data. However, high accessibility of sequencing services together with an increasing amount of available molecular data are providing easier and less critical support for taxonomic novelties without carefully studying the phenotype, particularly morphology. As a result, the accelerated rate of species descriptions has been unfortunately accompanied by numerous cases of overlooking previously described and well documented species, some of them that have been known for more than a century. Here, we critically examined recent literature, phenotypic and molecular data, and detected multiple issues with putative novelties of asexual Ascomycota traditionally known as hyphomycetes. In order to fix these taxonomic problems, three new combinations within the genera Pleopunctum, Camposporium and Sporidesmium, and two new names in Camposporium are proposed. Moreover, three genera, Aquidictyomyces, Fusiconidium and Pseudohelminthosporium, together with nine species are reduced to synonymy. The examples outlined here clearly show the relevance of morphology in modern phylogenetic studies and the importance of more stringent 'quality controls' during biodiversity studies documenting the extensive fungal diversity in a speedy manner.

The fungi of the order Onygenales can cause important human infections; however, their taxonomy and worldwide occurrence is still little known. We have studied and identified a representative number of clinical fungi belonging to that order from a reference laboratory in the USA. A total of 22 strains isolated from respiratory tract (40%) and human skin and nails (27.2%) showed a malbranchea-like morphology. Six genera were phenotypically and molecularly identified, i.e. Auxarthron/Malbranchea (68.2%), Arachnomyces (9.1%), Spiromastigoides (9.1%), and Currahmyces (4.5%), and two newly proposed genera (4.5% each). Based on the results of the phylogenetic study, we synonymized Auxarthron with Malbranchea, and erected two new genera: Pseudoarthropsis and Pseudomalbranchea. New species proposed are: Arachnomyces bostrychodes, A. graciliformis, Currahmyces sparsispora, Malbranchea gymnoascoides, M. multiseptata, M. stricta, Pseudoarthropsis crassispora, Pseudomalbranchea gemmata, and Spiromastigoides geomycoides, along with a new combination for Malbranchea gypsea. The echinocandins showed the highest in vitro antifungal activity against the studied isolates, followed by terbinafine and posaconazole; in contrast, amphotericin B, fluconazole, itraconazole and 5-fluorocytosine were less active or lacked in vitro activity against these fungi.